


Kingdom Hearts Reader Insert

by Etay10



Category: Kingdom Hearts (Video Games)
Genre: F/M, Reader-Insert
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-30
Updated: 2020-11-08
Packaged: 2021-03-04 07:33:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 7
Words: 25,637
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24989875
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Etay10/pseuds/Etay10
Summary: This story is from your point of view, being close friends with Sora, Riku, and Kairi.  It starts from the beginning of Kingdom Hearts I and should end at the end of Kingdom Hearts II (maybe Kingdom Hearts III?  It's a WIP.).  There will be a lot of parts that will be different because I'd like to get through KH I quickly so that Organization XIII can show up and Demyx, Zexion, and Axel aren't left out. The BOCs are as follows:  Sora, Riku, Leon, Cloud, Demyx, Zexion, and Axel.  One of the changes I've made is that Sora, Riku, and Kairi are all a little older (late high school/early college).
Relationships: Axel (Kingdom Hearts)/Reader, Cloud Strife/Reader, Demyx (Kingdom Hearts)/Reader, Leon (Kingdom Hearts)/Reader, Riku (Kingdom Hearts)/Reader, Sora (Kingdom Hearts)/Reader, Zexion (Kingdom Hearts)/Reader
Comments: 7
Kudos: 24





	1. The Beginning

“We’re really doing this,” you stated in awe as you sat with your friends, staring out at the sunset over the waves.

“Tomorrow, we see it all,” Riku grinned. His arms were folded across his chest as he leaned back against the ramshackle-yet-sturdy raft the four of you had pieced together.

“I can’t wait!” Sora bounced on the balls of his feet and Kairi giggled at his excitement.

You watched as Riku’s grin quirked up a little higher at the light sound of her small laughs and Sora beamed at her. Silly boys. You rolled your eyes.

They were both almost twenty and neither of them could bring it upon themselves to talk to her about their crush on her. You had watched them watch her since you were all old enough to play together without adult supervision, some seven or eight years ago. That’s not the only thing that had lasted that long. The four of you had promised to see what was out there besides Destiny Island one day. Turns out that day is tomorrow.

“If we’re going to head out early tomorrow we should probably get some sleep,” you added thoughtfully.

Sora’s head fell with a groan and you fought another eye roll. 

Riku sighed before nodding. “C’mon, Sora. I’ll race you back.”

“I don’t want to go back.”

“So you think you’ll lose…” Riku prodded Sora while glancing up at you with a smirk.

“What!? No way, you’re on!”

They both ran back to find their beds first and you were left with Kairi.

“Are you ready for tomorrow?” she asked you, head tilted at you curiously.

“I think so,” you answered slowly. “I mean it’s not that I don’t like Destiny Islands, this place will always feel like home, but I want to know what’s out there.”

“Yeah,” Kairi smiled at you. “Me, too.”

\----------

You found yourself awake in the middle of the night. Sometime before that you had fallen into a shallow, dreamless sleep, still excited for the next day. Now, though, you were staring up at a very dark corner of your ceiling.

“Ah!”

You jumped. That had sounded like Sora, but it had come from your open window. He hadn’t sounded scared so much as panicked and labored, like he was trying to hit something really hard. You sat up and looked toward the window, eyebrows knitted together in worry. 

Where was the moonlight?

You stood and looked out at the beach. Sora was out there, surrounded by darkness and strange creatures with large, unblinking yellow eyes.

They were trying to hurt him.

“Sora!” you called out to him, but he couldn’t hear you.

You needed help. Should you get Riku? Or Wakka and Tidus? You didn’t think you had time. You grabbed the old wooden sword you used to spar with Sora and Riku with from deep under your bed before turning and running down the stairs and outside.

“Sora!” You almost couldn’t see him from ground level, but his spiky brown hair bobbed here and there above the darkness. Your shout alerted a pair of creatures near you and they turned to scurry over in you direction. You clenched your jaw and widened you stance. Hopefully you could fight them off. 

Hopefully.

Your grip on the wooden sword tightened and you swung. Their yellow eyes vanished and your breath caught in surprise. A moment later they sprung up on either side of you, attacking simultaneously. You hissed as a claw caught your left arm, but you managed to block the other one. You swung at the stunned creature you blocked, the movement taking you away out of the reach of the other small monster. Your sword hit the abdomen of the creature but bounced off with a short ringing sound. You grunted and swung again, but the outcome was the same.

How were you supposed to fight off all these monsters using only defense? It was time for a tactic change.

You jumped back after blocking another swing to observe the horde in front of you. Maybe if you could block your way to Sora, you could both find a way out and flee. You set your stance before beginning forward momentum into the mob of black bodies.

Sora’s back was turned to you, but he must have finally caught your movement because he turned and saw you after you were a yard from him.

“[NAME]!” Sora’s eyes widened in fear.

“Sora!” you called back. “We need to-” you paused to swing at a monster “-fight our way out!”

Sora’s face set sternly and he nodded, turning toward you fully. You noticed the giant key in his hand.

“Wha-” you turned your confused eye from the key to the small creature that had launched itself at you. Your sword came up to block, but the force from the creature knocked the old piece of wood out of your hand. It was flung into the horde and lost.

“Ah!” you cried out in pain as the beasts surrounding you tore at your arms. You had raised them in defense, the only defense you had left.

Sora suddenly cut through the creatures and you took a deep breath, thanking the currently nonexistent stars for your friend. 

“Are you okay?” he asked, fending off more foes.

You grunted an affirmative before turning to watch his back. Maybe you could kick the little monsters down.

“Look out!” you called as three jumped to attack the both of you at once. Sora spun and clocked one before driving his large key through the second. The third, however, was flying directly toward your face. Your arms flew up in defense again. 

I could really use a key… blade like his.

You felt metal in your grip and opened your eyes in time to see the creature gorge itself on the giant key in your hand. Sora glanced at your new weapon before grinning. You took a deep breath before joining in the battle again.

It didn’t seem to take long after that for Sora and yourself to clear your way. The two of you did more than clear a path, though. You had taken out all of the little monsters. 

“What were those?” you were out of breath.

“I don’t know,” Sora was grinning, “but we kicked their-”

The ground started to shake and something began to rise from the shadows. You found two huge yellow eyes and realized it was a ten-story shadow man.

“Sora…” you breathed.

You saw him square himself. You were stuck, arms hanging loosely at your sides and head tilted up. Your eyes were wide. And then Sora charged.

“Sora!” you called out after him, holding up an empty right hand as if you could pull him back. Your weapon had somehow disappeared again, but you didn’t think too hard on that because if you could call Sora back you might have the chance for escape. “Sora!”

You realized he wasn’t going to run from this. He must be crazy, but there was nothing you could do about that now.

The giant shadow man bent down to touch the ground a couple of yards away from you and you could feel the world shake as his fist seemed to try to consume the little light left and a cloud of darkness burst outward. It knocked you off of your feet and you landed in the sand with a cry of pain.

“Ah!” Sora shouted as he struck at the hand.

You had to fight. Or… Sora and you could both die. You realized this as you stared up at the monster. What was that weapon you had used? What did you call it? A keyblade…

You felt cool metal in your right hand again and stood, preparing to rush forward. You charged and swung at the hand. Your keyblade cut into it and you wrenched it out before striking again. You fought with Sora for what seemed an endless amount of time before the monster started to slow and groan.

“We can do this,” you realized out loud.

“Yeah!” Sora cheered in agreement.

You glanced over at him briefly with a small smile. Your enjoyment was cut short when the giant swung its other hand downward, colliding with your body. The air was knocked out of you before you could scream. The ground came hurtling toward you too fast.

“[NAME]!”

\----------

Sora turned from your motionless form and charged at the giant. He put everything he had into his next attacks, knowing that he had to get rid of this guy before he could check on you. The monster finally groaned for the last time. Sora ran as the ground shook, his feet sometimes slipping in the trembling sand. He slid down next to you, cradling your head in his lap carefully.

“[Name], [Name], please wake up!”

Then the world fell away.


	2. Waking Up

“C’mon, Sora!” your high-pitched, little-girl-[Name] voice called to the small, spiky haired brunette running after you. “I think Riku went this way!”

“[Name]!”

Your sunny day on the beach faded. That hadn’t been Sora’s little boy voice. And it had cracked.

Your eyelids shot open, but all you could see was a painful white so they shut again and you groaned softly. 

“[Name],” this time Sora was happy. A shadow leaned over you and your eyes opened again to see big blue ones over top of you.

“You’re okay,” you croaked out quietly, your voice hoarse. Your throat was dry. You leaned up to hug him and Sora met you halfway, holding you tight.

“Told you it was only a concussion!” a girl called from somewhere behind Sora.

You let go of your friend and looked around the room. You were in a small twin bed. There was a small table in the middle of the room with three empty chairs. Shelves and the corners of the room held boxes and trunks. A girl with short, black hair stood close by your bed. She looked shorter than you and you guessed she had been the one to speak. A tall guy with long brown hair was leaning casually against the wall. You noted the large sword strapped to his back and black leather jacket with fur trim. When he noticed you looking he looked away. Another girl stood by the table. She had long black hair and was talking quietly with a larger man who had a toothpick sticking out of his mouth and another guy with spiky blonde hair that reminded you of Sora’s.

“Oh!” Sora stood up. “These are my new friends. Yuffie,” the short girl waved, “Leon,” the guy with long hair nodded in your direction, “Tifa, Cid, and Cloud.” The other girl waved and smiled, but the other two guys seemed to be too wrapped up in conversation to greet you.

You lifted your arm to wave but hissed in pain when you felt the injuries under your bandages from the claws of the creatures that had attacked you.

“Are you thirsty?” Yuffie asked. You nodded and she left to grab a glass of water.

“Where are we?” you asked Sora quietly.

“Traverse Town,” he answered. “Our world was destroyed and we landed here.”

Your eyes widened. “We’re on a different world? What about Kairi and Riku? Wakka and Tidus and-”

“I don’t know,” Sora replied before you could get hysterical, “but these people say they can help us find them.”

“Oh.”

“Those things you fought,” Yuffie said as she came back and handed you your water, “they’re called heartless. That is what happens when the darkness overtakes you. They destroyed your world.”

“But we defeated them,” you wondered aloud after taking a drink.

“Must not have gotten all of them,” Yuffie shrugged. “Anyways, we’re a group of people that fight them, and we’d like to help you get your friends back.”

“…thank you.” Is that what you said to someone that was offering to help you save your friends? It didn’t seem to quite fit.

“We need both of you to do it with us, though,” Leon spoke up. “Both keyblade wielders.”

“It’s really called a keyblade?” you asked.

“Mhm,” Yuffie nodded.

“We’re going to be heroes, [Name]!” Sora cheered.

“O-Okay,” you grinned half-heartedly at him and lay back on the small twin bed. Your attempt at understanding everything was coming up a little short. 

“Alright, Darlin’,” the older man with the toothpick sticking out of his mouth walked over to you. “I think it’s time we let you rest again. Leon, why don’t you stay here with Sora and [Name]. The rest of us are going to the gummi garage.”

Half an hour later Sora was asleep in a chair next to your bed and Leon was across the room in an armchair by the window.

“So…” you decided to start a conversation with Leon. You weren’t tired. As Sora had said, you had just slept for ‘forever.’ “Are you from this world?”

Leon looked up at you for a moment before looking at the floor. “No.”

You stared at him, but he didn’t continue so you shifted in your bed and sighed quietly. Your arms felt crusty from dried blood and you looked down at your bandaged arms with a frown. Most of the bandages had bled through.

You heard footsteps and turned to see that Leon was walking towards you now. “I’m from a world called Hollow Bastion. It used to be called Radiant Garden, but the heartless destroyed it and took over. I think you need clean bandages.”

You nodded in agreement and he gently lifted one of your arms to start unwrapping it. He took the wet cloth on the side table and started to clean your arm off with it. You clenched your teeth to keep from hissing in pain.

“A man named Ansem lives there now.” Leon continued. “We think he is the one in charge of the heartless. He researched them before this started and we’ve been finding that research scattered across different worlds. We’ve been trying to figure out his plans so that we can stop him, but he has many allies.”

“Do you know how to stop the heartless?” you asked as he moved onto rewrapping your arm with clean bandages.

“Each world has a keyhole. If we shut those keyholes, the heartless can’t get in. We need your keyblades to do that.”

He finished bandaging your arms and you thanked him. He walked into another room, you assumed it was a kitchen, and returned with a glass full of green liquid. He held it out to you, saying, “This should help you heal.”

You stared skeptically at the green liquid for a moment before he chuckled and pushed it closer at you. “It’s a healing potion. I’ve used it many times before you and it works a lot better than trying to heal yourself. Trust me. It doesn’t even taste that bad.” He chuckled a little and you glanced up to see a small smirk on his face.

You took the glass out of his hands and examined the potion more closely. “It’s not going to… turn me into a frog or anything?”

He laughed this time, and you smiled, realizing how silly you sounded. Then, you took a drink. It tasted like… spring. Refreshing and cool and fresh. You instantly felt better.

“Thanks,” you said again, handing him the empty glass.

Leon just smirked at you as if to say, ‘See? You’re not a frog.’ Then he turned and walked back into the kitchen. You spent the rest of the day talking with Leon about the current situation or playing games with Sora. It was after dinner by the time the others returned.

“Feeling better, [Name]?” Tifa asked as she walked in the door ahead of everyone else. Cloud walked in behind her and you noticed he was wearing the same frown he had been wearing earlier as his blue eyes briefly found yours.

“Much better,” your smile was small as you answered her.

“Good!” Yuffie cheered as she entered the room. “Because we’re ready to start when you are!”

“Start what exactly?” you asked sheepishly.

“Visiting other worlds and locking keyholes,” Tifa told you. She came over and lifted one of your arms to look at the bandages. She unwrapped it until she could see one of the gashes, but it didn’t look like a gash anymore, it looked more like a deep scratch and you smiled. “Looks like we might be ready to start training you by tomorrow,” she continued.

“Awesome!” Sora pumped a fist into the air.

\----------

The next day you spent most of the morning up and about the small house. Thanks to the potion Leon had given you, your wounds had completely healed. All that was left was a small ache in your lower back from lying in that bed for so long. You were getting restless and you felt bad that you had taken over the only bed you had seen in the house, although you hadn’t been upstairs so you assumed there were more up there. This bed had to be here for a reason, though, right? Someone must need it and now you didn’t any longer. So you slowly got out of bed as the sun had just risen, feeling ready to take on the world, or at least take on some heartless later during training. There was a pile of folded clothes that looked like they would fit you next to the bed and you smiled, happy to get out of the pajamas that you had helped Sora fight heartless in on the beach. You made the bed before grabbing the clothes and changing. After that you walked into the small kitchen. Breakfast for the crew should be a good thank you for taking care of me.

You found enough bacon, eggs, and bread to make French toast for everyone. You busied yourself by the stove as you prepared the food. You started to heat two pans, one for bacon and one for eggs. It smelled delicious and it was difficult for you to keep from eating while you cooked. You stole a piece of bacon for yourself, unable to resist.

You were halfway through making everything when you heard the first pair of footsteps coming down the stairs. You turned expecting Yuffie because you assumed with all her energy she must be a morning person, but instead a blonde spiky head that was taller than you entered the doorway and Cloud’s stern blue eyes surveyed the area. He wasn’t frowning, and he wasn’t smiling either. 

Suddenly you were nervous. What if they get mad at me for using their food without asking? You smiled sheepishly at him. “Good morning! I thought I’d make everyone breakfast as a thank you for taking care of me.”

Cloud stared at the food cooking for a moment before walking over to the coffee machine.

Okay, maybe he wasn’t really awake yet. You know he had heard you; he was looking right at you as you talked. “I know I probably should’ve asked first, but if you want I can pay you guys back for some of the food or… something. It’s not really a gift if it’s coming from your own fridge but I figured someone would have to make breakfast anyway, why not the girl that has been lying in bed for too long?” You giggled nervously at the end and realized you had rambled. 

Cloud grabbed his coffee and turned back to you. He nodded simply at you before leaving the kitchen and you wondered what that meant.

You couldn’t believe you had rambled. You never rambled. You always thought it was easier to not say anything than spew whatever came to mind at people. Even when you had scored higher on a test than Riku in grade school and he had been so surprised and angry that after school he had cornered you. You were quiet as the silverette interrogated whether you had cheated on the test or if you had just been lucky. Your answers were one word sentences. You smiled as third grader Riku walked away, wishing you luck on the next test, and so began your rivalry with the little boy in class. It lasted through high school, the both of you getting multiple scholarships when you graduated, and now you were supposed to go to college and continue competing with the guy… but that world was gone. Your world was gone.

POP.

“Shoot!” you jumped back as a bacon grease bubble had snapped at you and hit your arm. You shook your head as you flipped the bacon and French toast. You missed that boy. You hoped he was alright out there, missing you and Sora, too.

You were right about Yuffie. She was the next to come down the stairs and just as you were finishing breakfast Tifa came down. Looks like you would have to wake up the others. Good, I’ll deliver breakfast in bed. You smiled at the idea. You walked out to let the three that were awake know that they could fill their plates, then followed them back into the kitchen. They grabbed their food, Yuffie’s plate stacked higher than the rest which made you laugh lightly. After they thanked you (Cloud giving you a quiet ‘thanks’ and nod of his head again without a smile) you filled a plate with food and grabbed a glass of orange juice before walking up the stairs looking for Leon’s room. It was simple enough to find. It was the first door on the right of the hallway. The door was already somewhat cracked open and you opened it further with your foot. It creaked and you found a very small room with a single twin bed and not much room for anything else. A large black duffel bag sat in the corner of the room, you assumed that’s where Leon’s belongings are. 

Leon laid in bed on his back, the blankets up to his chest. He’s shirtless. You realized this with wide eyes. Maybe this was an invasion of privacy. Maybe you should just leave it outside the door… or knock on the door and ask if it was okay to come in. You huffed a sigh, deciding you were already in the room and you might as well just go for it.

“Leon-”

“You just gonna stand there and stare or are you going to wake me up?”

Your cheeks flushed as you watched his eyes open and he smirked at you as he sat up and stretched. “I- uh- I made breakfast for you!” you recovered slowly from you nerves and held out the plate and glass. “Just trying to show my appreciation for everyone taking care of me.”

“Mmm,” Leon smirked as he took the food, “thank you, [Name].”

“You’re welcome,” you replied, still blushing lightly. 

You left quickly before you could stare at his upper body for too long and make things even more awkward. Once downstairs again you quickly put together another plate headed back upstairs. You breezed by Leon’s room and checked each room until you found Sora in the last one. Had Cid not come back from the garage late last night? You recalled he had left to put some final touches on the gummi ship but you figured he had returned after you had fallen asleep.

“Morning, Sora!” you chirped at the boy as you sat on his bed with the food in his hands. The brunette was all spread out on the small twin bed, the sheets twisted around his form. He wasn’t wearing a shirt, but that didn’t catch you off guard, you knew the boy didn’t wear one when he slept. The group of you four had had too many sleepovers for you to get nervous about it or feel shy. He snored once more, softly, and you realized you hadn’t woken him up. You hoped the smell of the food might help wake him up but apparently it hadn’t.

“Sora!” you shouted.

The boy’s eyes shot open and he groaned. “[Name], we don’t have school today, it’s Saturday.” He rolled over.

You laughed. “Okay, first off it’s a Tuesday in the middle of summer, second we’re not even in high school anymore and you always manage to not have class Monday mornings, and third we’re not… in Destiny Islands.” Your smile had faded at the end of your explanation.

“O-oh,” Sora sat up and looked around himself, realizing where he was.

“I brought you breakfast,” you smiled gently at him. “I figured you’d need it since we start training today.”

“Thanks, [Name],” he beamed at you as he took the plate and drink. You nodded and smiled again before beginning to get up. “Wait,” he stopped you. “You know we’re going to fix this, right? Everything is going to be great again. And we’ll find Riku and Kairi and everyone else and get Destiny Islands back.”

You sighed, his words relaxing you some. “Thanks, Sora.”

He nodded at you with a smile.

You stood and walked out the door to his room, calling behind you that you’d see him downstairs. Once you were downstairs you asked the group where Cid was.

“He must still be at his garage,” Tifa told you with a shrug.

“Yeah, sometimes he does that,” Yuffie nodded.

“Oh,” you said thoughtfully. “Is there any way I can still take him breakfast?”

“Yeah,” Tifa smiled, “but no promises he won’t be grumpy when you get there.”

You laughed, “That’s alright, he should probably eat and it sounds like he’s too stubborn to stop and take the time himself.”

“Hit that nail right on the nose,” Yuffie laughed.

Tifa rolled her eyes, turning to look at the shorter girl, “Its hit that one on the nose, or hit that nail on the head, Yuffie.”

“Oh,” Yuffie giggled, “my bad. Just trying to use my new other-worldly sayings.”

You laughed at her before fixing up a small plate and putting it in a box Tifa assured you would keep it warm.

“It’s in another district and [Name] doesn’t know how to get there,” you heard Tifa tell Cloud. “Could you take her while I wait for Leon to get down here? The two of you can just meet us in district two to start their training afterward.”

Cloud grunted an affirmative and you walked out into the living room with Cid’s food. Tifa told you that he would show you the way and the two of you would most likely have to fight off heartless on the way there, but that that district one should be heartless free.

“Ready?” Cloud asked and you turned your head to make sure that it was he who had spoken. You had never actually heard him speak directly to you yet. You nodded and followed him out the door. I thought his voice would be… rougher.

The two of you stepped outside and heartless seemed to spring up immediately. You thought of your weapon, the keyblade, and it appeared in your hand again, ready to strike at the dark creatures. Cloud dispatched most of them, but two of them directly blocked your path to the big doors into district one and you took care of those one handed, trying your best not to throw Cid’s breakfast around too much. Cloud opened the doors for you and they closed quickly behind you. 

You saw people in this district, walking from shop to shop peacefully. Cloud took you up a set of stairs and you saw a messy garage at the top of another set of stairs. 

“This is it,” Cloud nodded his head in the direction of the garage you had seen. You smiled at him and his use of more than one word in a sentence before looking for a path through the multitude of parts and tools and moving forward.

You heard a curse from the back and assumed Cid must be deep in the mess. You sighed and hoped he wasn’t too frustrated with whatever he was doing to be happy to see you. You could see the back wall now and saw that Cid was in a corner tinkering with an oddly shaped hunk of metal. In the other corner of the room was a small office with its lights on, a large window into the garage showing you a desk and you thought you could see a cot behind it.

“Morning, Cid!” you called as you approached.

The gruff blond looked up from his work in surprise; apparently he hadn’t heard you come in. “[Name]! What are ya doin’ here, Darlin’? What time is it?”

“Uh, maybe nine or ten…? I made breakfast for everyone,” you smiled as you came to stand next to him and held up the bag. “And I thought I should bring you some. Tifa said you hadn’t come back last night.”

“Well,” he smiled and leaned back in his creaky, old office chair that looked like it was covered in grease and oil stains and a multitude of tears and cuts decorated the fabric, “ain’t you just the sweetest?”

You smiled up at the ceiling and batted your eyelashes, “If only heaven sent more like me.” Your joking made Cid chuckle and you continued, “But really I just wanted to do something to thank everyone for taking care of me.”

“No problem,” he smiled at you as he took out his plate. He eyed the food hungrily before digging in.

“There’s orange juice in the thermos there, too.” You giggle lightly at how quickly he was shoving food into his mouth. “Did you get much sleep last night?”

He shrugged and swallowed before answering, “Couple o’ hours.”

“Cid!” you said astonished. “That’s not good for you.” Maybe it wasn’t your place to tell him that, but the past couple of days Cid had made you feel like family, and he seemed like a strange uncle to you now. It hadn’t taken long, but you cared for these people.

“Oh, don’t worry about me,” he told you. “I’ll take a nap after I figure out this piece o’ garbage.”

You nodded, “Alright. I’m going to go back now. Sora and I are supposed to start training so…”

“Good luck, Darlin’,” Cid nodded at you. “Don’t let Leon push you too hard.”

You giggled sheepishly as the name brought up your memory of the guy in bed shirtless this morning. “Don’t worry, Cid, I can handle it.” You waved as you left and found Cloud still outside the shop, staring into shadows and lost in thought. 

Maybe, considering he had started speaking full sentences with me, I could get him to actually hold a conversation sometime.

“Alright, Cloud,” you smiled at him. “Let’s get this show on the road.”


	3. Good People and Good Food

“Ah!” you grunted as you cut through another creature of darkness. You guessed it had been an hour since you started training. Sora was across the square from you, fighting heartless, too. Cloud, Leon, Tifa, and Yuffie were all fighting the heartless that came at them. You marveled at how they all seemed to dance through the beings like this was a talent competition rather than a battle. The four of them were much, much more advanced than yourself and Sora.

You paused a moment to catch your breath. The last heartless had taken you outside of the group a little ways and you watched as the others fought, the four older members only dispatching the heartless that approached them, leaving as many for you and Sora as possible. Leon was the hardest on the two of you, but you were sure it was just to make sure that the two of you were ready. You figured he had been training for much longer than you and Sora to defeat the Heartless, and he wasn’t sure why the keyblades had chosen the two of you. He had been quiet walking here to train, a frown on his face, and Yuffie had leaned over to quietly tell you that it was most likely because he didn’t understand how the two of you, with no real experience whatsoever, had been granted the keyblades. He was frustrated with that fact, but there was nothing he could do, so he said nothing.

Leon’s weapon had caught you off guard when he first used it. He called it a gunblade, and it was exactly what it sounded like, a combination of gun and blade. He would swing at the heartless near him, easily taking it out, or help from further away with the bullets he shot. Yuffie fought with what looked like large ninja stars to you that she had called shuriken. She could throw them from a distance or use them to slice through the heartless by her. Cloud fought with the largest sword you had ever seen. It was no wonder he was built, having to swing that thing around. Tifa caught you off guard when she pulled on a pair of armored gloves and used her fists mostly to fight. One hard punch from her was enough to take care of a heartless. And then you watched Sora with his keyblade as he cut through a heartless similarly to the way you just had. You were amazed at the rate the two of you were improving. The others had been surprised when the two of you had showed them that you already knew the basics from sparring with each other. It felt natural to you, and you were sure that Sora felt the same way.

With a deep breath, you jumped back into the fray. You fought wave upon wave of heartless. Most of them were about your size and looked like soldiers, but some were small, annoying creatures that zipped around in the air and shot at you with fire and every now and then you’d meet with a large, round one that could only be fought from behind, but it liked to charge forward at you and knock you down. You and Sora found that it was best if the two of you fought this one together, one of you distracting it while the other came up behind it.

If the two of you got stuck, one of the others would step in and slay whatever was causing you problems before instructing you on a better way to take it out, or a more skillful attack to work on. This happened a lot in the beginning, but you found that they had almost stopped stepping in and helping out. They would occasionally shout from the sidelines, reminding you to widen your stance or set your footing the right way. It was getting much easier to take out the little monsters, too.

“What time is it?” you heard Yuffie finally call out something unrelated to fighting.

Tifa glanced at her watch, “It’s about three o’clock.”

We worked through lunch!

“Time to call it a day,” Leon said.

“Yes!” Yuffie cheered.

You all found your way back to the house. You were starving so you headed straight to the kitchen in the back to make a sandwich.

“Don’t eat too much!” you heard Tifa call after you. “We’re going out for dinner!”

Your eyebrows rose as you pulled out your materials for your sandwich. Out for dinner, huh? You wondered where you would all eat.

“And afterwards we can load up the gummi ship to leave tomorrow,” Leon added thoughtfully.

“Tomorrow!?” you blurted to yourself quietly.

Leon grunted an affirmative as he came into the kitchen and made a sandwich on the counter next to you.

“Oh,” you stared at your sandwich. “Do you think we’re ready?”

“You can take out anything we have here. It’s time to move on.”

“Hm,” you hummed in thought.

“Don’t worry,” Leon grinned at you lightly. “We should be back to Traverse Town afterwards to restock supplies and plan the next one.”

“So what’s the plan for this one? Where are we going?”

“I think everyone’s meeting in the living room to talk about it right now.”

You nodded and started to put away the condiments you had used. After that you grabbed your sandwich and a glass of water before following the tall brunette into the living room. You sat down next to Sora who started to eye your sandwich. You gave him half before he started to drool on himself.

“Thanks, [Name]!” he chirped with a smile before eating half of it in one bite.

You laughed, “You’re welcome, Sora.”

“Okay, we’re just waiting for Cid,” Tifa said as she glanced around the room.

You finished your sandwich by the time the door opened, but rather than the tall, gruff man you were expecting a duck and a dog walked in. At least, that’s what they looked like. The duck was wearing a shirt and the dog was walking like a person, with a shirt on, too.

“Hello!” the duck greeted everyone and your eyes widened even further.

“Heh-yuck,” the dog grinned at everyone, “Everyone’s here!”

“No,” the duck glanced around, “Cid’s missing.” Its eyes caught you and Sora and it stopped. “Who are you?”

“I-uh…” you let out a short, nervous giggle. You had never talked to a duck before. “I’m [Name] and this is Sora.”

“These are the keyblade wielders,” Tifa added.

“Oooh,” the duck grinned. “King Mickey will be glad to hear it… once we find him.”

“Welcome to the team,” the dog told you.

“I’m Donald,” the duck introduced itself and then pointed at the dog, “and this is Goofy.”

“Nice to meet you,” you smiled softly.

“King Mickey is a keyblade wielder, too,” Tifa told you. “Donald and Goofy are his men. He disappeared some time ago to fight the darkness and they’ve been looking for him.”

Donald and Goofy both saluted proudly, Goofy added a small “heh-yuck,” after his salute.

“They’ve worked with us on some missions,” Leon explained. “They’ll be helping us with this one.”

The door opened again and it almost hit Donald but the duck managed to jump out of the way in time.

“Hey!” the duck complained, “Watch it!”

Cid seemed to roll his eyes at the duck before walking into the room fully. “You watch it, duck,” he added gruffly.

“Hmph,” Donald crossed his arms.

“Well, now that everyone’s here we can start talking about where we’re going tomorrow,” Tifa started to focus the group. “Our first stop is Wonderland. We’ve been noticing a lot of heartless activity there and it’s fairly close. After that, if we don’t need to come back for supplies, we’ll go to Olympus. Hercules said they have been handling the situation, but it’s getting worse and Hades seems to have joined the side of the heartless.”

“I hate that guy,” Yuffie said with a frown as she crossed her arms. You smiled to yourself when you noticed how closely she resembled the duck across the room.

“Do we know what’s going on specifically in Wonderland?” Leon asked. He was leaning against the wall in the corner. His arms were crossed but it was in a more nonchalant way than Yuffie or Donald.

Tifa shook her head. “No, we don’t.”

“So it’s a be-ready-for-anything kind of mission?” Sora asked.

“Exactly,” Donald nodded.

“What should I, uh, pack?” you asked sheepishly. You had never packed for a mission before. This was all so new.

“Whatever you have with you,” Tifa told you with a small smile. “The gummi ship is big enough to hold everything.”

Your eyebrows scrunched together as you thought about what you had. The clothes you were wearing and your pajamas… you didn’t need to pack your keyblade… _Is that all I have to my name?_

Sora noticed your change in attitude and nudged you with his elbow. You smiled reassuringly at him and he returned it.

The meeting was quickly adjourned as Cloud asked if that’s all that needed to be covered before leaving to do who knows what. Well, you were sure someone else had an idea of where he was going but you had no clue. Everyone else slowly dispersed after that and you walked over to Tifa.

“What’s up, [Name]?” she turned to you with a smile.

“Oh, it’s just that I don’t have any clothes besides what I’m wearing right now. I was wondering if-”

“That means shopping!” Yuffie sung her excitement at the two of you. Apparently she had overheard you.

“She’s right,” Tifa smiled at you after she had glanced at Yuffie. “We’ll take you into town and after we’re done we’ll meet everyone for dinner. I forgot that we still needed to take you, we took Sora while you were out.”

“Okay,” you smiled, “Thanks!”

“Don’t worry about it,” Tifa told you. “You can’t be wearing the same thing every day.”

“A girl’s gotta have options,” Yuffie smiled and tugged the two of you toward the door.

* * *

“We’ll get your clothes first,” Tifa was explaining the strategy for your shopping trip with you as you walked into town. “And then after that I want to get you some armor and gear.”

You nodded, “Okay.” Yuffie was skipping ahead of the two of you. She led you into a store full of mostly athletic looking clothing.

“You need something you can move around in,” Tifa reminded you. “We don’t want you to get hurt because your clothes wouldn’t let you move properly.”

“You’re going to look cute!” Yuffie said, already grabbing clothes for you to try on from the racks.

You could tell Tifa was holding back an eye roll as she grinned at the shorter girl.

You walked through the racks picking up different things you liked. The sizes here were in a different system than you were used to, but Tifa and Yuffie gave you an estimate and you grabbed what you thought would fit. It took half an hour for the three of you to look through the clothes, and another half an hour to try them on and decide if you liked them or needed a different size. Eventually you ended up with enough clothes to last you until laundry was done. It was mostly pretty comfortable, although some pieces seemed to act like a second skin. Tifa had explained that this would be best during battle and that you wouldn’t want your clothing getting caught on anything or getting in your way. You agreed, but you weren’t used to wearing it so often. On Destiny Islands you had been used to loose beach-y clothes or simple t-shirts and shorts. Now you had clothing that ranged from thin material to keep you cool to thicker thermal outfits to keep you warm. I wonder if I’ll see snow. Yuffie had thrown in a couple of cute outfits and a dress, saying that it was essential to look cute occasionally.

“The next stop should be a little easier,” Tifa told you with a smile as she paid for the clothing. The three of you soon walked into an accessory shop and you found yourself staring at all of the gear on the walls and in cases. There was even jewelry that you came across. You stared into the case of it and admired the bracelets that were not only stylish but also boosted your magic. You weren’t sure how any of it worked but it was pretty amazing. You were pretty sure you didn’t have any magic, either.

“[Name], come look at these,” Tifa called you over to a case full of matching arm and leg guards. There was one set that came with a belt to hold some weapons. The set was made of a light metal that shone white in the light and all of the pieces were decorated with a swirling design that broke off into strange shapes with multiple corners.

“Mythril,” Tifa said, and you glanced over to see her looking at the same set you were looking at. “That looks like one of the best sets here. And it looks like it’s on sale.” She picked up the pieces, “Here, try it on.”

You took the pieces from her and she helped you put them on. They strapped on with buckles and you were surprised by how little they weighed and the metal’s flexibility. The material seemed to have the motion of soft leather rather than what you expected of metal. You admired them on yourself and Tifa smiled at you.

“Ooooo,” Yuffie walked up with wide eyes, “I like those.”

“Me, too,” you agreed with a smile.

“Good!” Tifa smiled, too. “Those should increase your defense by a lot and give you a little more agility. I was thinking we get you some strength earrings, too.”

“Okay.” You followed her over to the glass counter. Underneath was all of the jewelry. The strength earrings all looked like diamonds to you and you picked out a pair of simple studs.

Tifa helped you take everything off before taking it to the cashier and paying him. “Looks like we’ll be right on time.” She led Yuffie and yourself to the door.

* * *

You met the rest of the group at a small restaurant in the middle of Traverse Town. The waiters had to push two tables together and you found yourself at one end of the long group, sitting next to Sora who sat at the head of the table. On the other side of you was Yuffie and across from you were Cloud and Goofy. The others sat at the other end of the table and it was somewhat difficult to make out what they were saying so you decided to focus your attention on the people closest to you. It didn’t take long for everyone to order. Sora and Yuffie began to talk about Wonderland as you waited for your food.

“I’ve heard the world is a little… strange,” Yuffie told him.

“Really?” Sora replied, “Strange how?”

“Tifa hasn’t told me much- I don’t think she knows much about it herself- but I think she said something about a talking door.”

“Wow,” Sora smirked, “That is strange.”

“Mhm, and the military is a bunch of cards.”

“What?” you laughed lightly at Yuffie’s last statement.

“Yeah,” Yuffie smiled and laughed, “That’s what I was thinking, too, but that’s what Tifa said.”

“Hm.”

“They serve the Queen of Hearts,” Cloud stated monotonously and you looked up in surprise. He wasn’t looking at any of you, just staring down at the table in thought.

“Oh,” Sora continued as if it wasn’t strange that Cloud knew this information and had spoken up about it. “How do you know that?”

“I visited once. Shortly.”

You nodded appreciatively and hummed in interest.

“Yeah,” Yuffie began to explain, “Cloud was sort of a drifter before we picked him up.”

“Oh,” you smiled across the table at him, “How many worlds have you been to?”

“Most of them,” he answered. You had thought you had seen a slight smirk but it was gone too quickly for you to be sure.

“Oh, wow,” you smiled sincerely. “I’d love to hear about them.”

“I can’t wait to see them!” Sora smirked, excited. “And save them.”

“Right,” you turned your gaze to Sora with a smile.

“It’s a good thing you’re here,” Goofy told the two of you. “Now we can really start taking out Heartless.”

“Happy to help!” Sora told him.

You nodded and hummed your agreement, “Mhm.”

The food arrived then and you almost drooled at the plate set in front of you. Your whole table smelled amazing, and it didn’t take long for you all to dig in. The talking quieted as everyone filled their mouths with food. You hoped you would get another meal like this soon, but everyone knew it wouldn’t be tomorrow, so you ate slowly, savoring the taste and taking it all in. You enjoyed the company of your new friends and you were thankful for that, too. Yuffie began to tell the story of how shopping had gone, adding jokes about the failed outfits you had tried on and you laughed with everyone else.

“There was this one shirt,” Yuffie giggled before she continued, “this shirt that I’m not sure who had grabbed but-”

“You definitely grabbed it!” Tifa added, laughing and looking accusingly at the other girl across the table.

“…but,” Yuffie continued, pretending she hadn’t heard Tifa, “she was swimming in it! You could’ve fit ten of her into it!” Yuffie started to laugh loudly. “So we all took a picture in it!” Her last statement was difficult to understand through her laughter but everyone seemed to make it out.

You blushed lightly as she took out her phone and showed off the picture to the rest of the table. Your face was between Yuffie’s and Tifa’s in the neck of the shirt and they each stuck out one arm through a sleeve. You all had made a funny face and avoided looking at your tongue sticking out of your face as the camera came around the table. You noticed Cloud glance at it before handing it to Sora, who began laughing and then pointed at you.

“You’re face!” he laughed, “You only make this face when you take pictures with Selphie and Kairi. Remember when I stole that picture out of your room and-”

“Sora,” you said as you laughed sheepishly, your face turning even redder. “I don’t think they want to hear about-”

“-and used it as blackmail to make you help me with studying for that one math test?”

You rolled your eyes, glad he hadn’t mentioned that the picture he was referring to was from when the three of you were thirteen and had dressed up as rock stars using your mother’s clothes and make up.

“You needed to blackmail to get someone to help you study?” Tifa asked Sora, an eyebrow raised curiously.

“Well… hehe…” Sora’s hand found the back of his head where it itched sheepishly.

“He was a terrible studier,” you told her. “His attention span lasted ten minutes before he would have to stand up and find something active to do.”

“She helped me out by coming over and we’d have work-out-slash-study sessions,” Sora shrugged. “I got an A- on the test.”

“And I gained some upper body strength,” you grinned.

“Huh,” Yuffie grunted her response.

You thought of something and looked over at Sora, the grin on your face falling apart somewhat as you tried to keep it up, “Now that picture’s gone.”

“We’ll get it back,” Sora smiled reassuringly at you before resting his hand on your wrist you had set on the table, “We’ll get it all back.”

You nodded at him, the smile on your face softening a little. _Oh, yeah. That’s our job, isn’t it? To save the worlds. We can do this. Right?_ The confidence in Sora’s features was enough to reassure you. In that moment you were excited for tomorrow and what Wonderland would hold.


	4. Stars

You looked up at the gummi ship in front of you with awe. It certainly looked like a something that would fly between worlds; large and aerodynamic. The ramp that led inside went up to a height that was taller than two of you standing one on top of the other. The door at the end of the ramp led to what looked like a common seating area, though it was hard to tell from the ground. You could make out a couple of chairs and the overhead lights.

“Do ya like her?” Cid grinned at you as he stepped beside you.

You nodded, “I’ve never ridden in one before.”

“A first-timer?” he asked rhetorically. “Ah, I think you’ll like it.”

“Hm,” you glanced at him with a smile before returning your eyes to the ship. “So you’ll be driving?”

Cid nodded with a smirk and crossed his arms, “Yeah.” 

“Are Donald and Goofy meeting us here, too?” you asked, glancing around for the duck and dog.

“No, they’ll be flying themselves. That way, if we need to split up after Wonderland we can.”

“Hey, [Name],” Yuffie walked up to the two of you. “What’s up, Cid?”

“Just waiting for everyone to load up before we can take off,” he told her, giving her an accusing look.

“Alright, alright,” Yuffie grinned sheepishly and held up her hands, palms out, in surrender, “I’ll go get my bags!”

You lifted your duffel bag from the ground to put the strap on your shoulder. Tifa had given you one that she said she hadn’t been using. “I guess I’ll go load up,” you told Cid with a smile before walking onto the ramp. The room you walked into was full of comfortable looking chairs in a row forming a semicircle facing the front of the ship, where there were three seats in front of the controls. To the right was an open doorway that led to a small, simple kitchen. In front of you were narrow looking stairs which you assumed led to the cabins upstairs, so you followed them up. They came out onto a long hallway with doors lining either side at regular intervals. Most were open, people inside settling themselves into the small rooms. You walked back until you found a closed door. _Maybe I should knock to make sure there isn’t anyone inside._ You were about to lift your hand to knock when a voice turned you around.

“I’d pick the one across the hall if I was you,” Leon said, smirking at you.

Your eyebrows rose, “Why?”

“Yuffie was messing around with her shurikens and ripped apart the cot in that one.”

“Oh,” your eyes widened, imagining the room torn apart by a certain short, dark-haired girl.

Leon chuckled lightly before returning to his room. You stepped across the hall like he suggested and opened the door to find the room empty except for a cot. The walls and floor were white and the sheets on the bed were a plain blue with a matching pillow. You set your duffel bag on top of it and wondered what you were supposed to do now. The rooms weren’t big enough for dressers. You leaned back against the opposite wall and you elbow hit something that moved, making a clicking noise. You stepped away from the wall and watched a drawer slide out.

“Wow,” you admired the drawer like it had appeared from pure magic. Now, as you looked closer, you could see slits big enough for you to fit your fingers into and open the drawers. There were four drawers in total and the one on the bottom held an extra set of sheets. You unpacked your clothes and set your duffel bag at the end of your bed.

“Hey!” Sora greeted you from your doorway.

“Hi,” you smiled back.

“This is pretty cool,” he told you, motioning with a hand at the whole of the ship.

“Yeah,” you agreed.

“Cid said I should come get you so you can watch us take off.”

“Oh,” you straightened up. “That sounds so cool,” you smiled at the brunette as you approached him. “Sora, we’re about to takeoff.”

“I know, right? Flying in a gummi ship to another world. Who could’ve guessed a year ago that this is what we’d be doing today?”

“Pfft,” you passed him and he followed you towards the end of the hall that led to the stairs, “Not me.”

The area full of seating was abuzz with Cid shouting orders from the middle seat in front of the controls and the others rushing around to make sure everything was ready for takeoff. You saw Leon sitting in one of the comfortable looking seats and decided to grab the chair next to his while Sora sat on your other side. 

“Hi,” you greeted Leon with a small smile.

He nodded in your and Sora’s direction. “Keep your head down and you might make it through this without having to get up and help out.”

You laughed, “What’s everyone even doing?”

“Well, Cid has Cloud doing some last minute checks on the engines and Tifa is making sure we have everything we need. I’m not really sure what Yuffie is doing. She was helping Tifa but I think she got distracted.” Leon’s eyebrows rose as he looked at the short girl quickly bustling about the room but not really doing anything.

You couldn’t hold in your giggle as you watched her for a moment.

“Sora!” Cid called as if he was greeting an old friend for the first time in a long time, but the smirk on his face told you he was going to mess with the keyblade wielder.

Sora turned to face him, “Yeah?”

“Cloud needs help re-greasing something in engine two.”

“I don’t-” he started to protest.

“This is what you get for knocking down my tool cart!” Cid told him.

“Aw,” Sora’s head fell with a frown but he got up anyway and walked back toward a door you had seen Cloud exit and then reenter. 

“He knocked down one of Cid’s tool carts?” you asked Leon with a giggle.

“Yeah,” Leon nodded, “I’m surprised you didn’t hear it. He was hauling his duffel bag through Cid’s garage and it caught the edge of the cart, which clattered over, tools scattering everywhere.”

“Oh, Sora,” you shook your head with a grin. That just sounded like something that would happen to him. 

A few minutes later, while Leon was talking to Cid about gummi ship stuff and you were attempting to pick up a few terms and phrases about gummi mechanics, Sora came back through the doorway he had left through and he was followed by Cloud. Your eyes found his dark hands and you realized they were covered in grease. He caught you looking and smirked lightly before walking over.

“Hey, [Name],” he greeted as he approached, “would you like a handshake?”

“Nope!” you scooted back in your seat and away from his outstretched hand.

“C’mon, I’m pretty good with handshakes. No? How about a hug? You’re a hug kind of person, aren’t you?”

You laughed as he advanced again, this time with his arms spread for a hug. You squealed and slipped by one of his arms and out of your chair. Sora turned to face you and started laughing. Your eyebrows came together in confusion and you looked to Leon for help but he had apparently gotten up. You found him at the front, so you turned back to Sora with a frown.

“What? What’s so funny?”

He laughed again and pointed to your right cheek, “You’ve got something on your face.”

You lifted your hand to brush your cheek and your fingers came back into view with grease on them. “Sora!”

“Your face found my hand,” he laughed as he replied. “You’re the one that got up.”

You rolled your eyes, “Alright, well let’s go wash this off before we takeoff.”

You found the bathroom next to the kitchen. It was small, but you expected it to be. You walked right up to the sink and started to run the water. You started scrubbing your face with soap and water and Sora stepped in next to you, the bathroom was too small for each of you to have your own space so his side was against yours. It took longer for him to wash his hands off, considering they were pretty much covered in the goopy stuff. You waited for him to walk back with you, which you soon learned was a mistake because he flicked water at you with his fingers and you jumped back and out into the hallway.

“Hey! I was being nice and waiting for you!” you scolded with a laugh.

“I know, thanks,” he stuck his tongue out at you. 

“You’re welcome,” you stuck your tongue out back at him.

You both entered the control room to find everyone had found a seat. The two of you reclaimed your seats by Leon and you saw Cloud was sitting next to Cid by the controls.

“Everything ready?” Cid asked.

“Yes,” Tifa nodded.

“Everyone ready?” Cid asked her.

She looked over at everyone, “Yes, everyone’s seated.”

Cid nodded and started flipping switches. Everyone around you started buckling the seatbelts that were hanging towards the floor from all of the seats and you looked at Sora who shrugged, which you understood as, “I guess we should buckle up, too.” You could feel pressure in the cabin as the ship sealed itself from the outside. And then you felt like you were in the takeoff of an airplane, but four times as powerful. You were glad the seats were heavily padded because this lasted for about five minutes. You spent the time quietly glancing at Sora, whose eyes were wide with surprise at the feeling. You were sure you looked similar. The sky you could see from the huge windows in the front of the ship started to grow darker and soon you were seeing stars. The pressure started to subside and you were amazed at all of the little lights in the sky. You were pretty sure you could recognize some constellations, but now the windows were so full of stars it was difficult to tell. Plus, the constellations you knew were from looking up from the beach at Destiny Islands. _Am I staring at the stars from a completely different angle than before?_

“This is…” you started to comment on your wonder at the view, but couldn’t come up with a word for it.

“Amazing,” Sora filled in for you, but you both knew that word was an understatement.

“Pretty great, huh?” Yuffie asked from behind you.

“Yes,” you glanced back at her with a smile before quickly returning your gaze back to the windows. You wanted to stare at those stars for as long as you could. “I’ve never seen so many stars.”

“I remember the first time I had seen it,” you heard Tifa comment from across the aisle from you and Sora. “I couldn’t find any words. I still can’t, really.”

The ship had gone into a more relaxed state of flight now that you were all out of the atmosphere of Traverse Town and its world. Cid pressed some buttons on a touch pad and then he took his hands off of the steering mechanism. “One of my favorite places to be,” you could hear him join the conversation while looking out the windows with the rest of you. Everyone around you started to take their seatbelts off. Cloud stood and walked out of the room and down into a doorway you had not been through, so you weren’t sure where he was going. Then again, it was hard for you to say where he was going whenever he left the group.

“Is anyone else hungry?” Yuffie asked as she stood up and stretched.

“I am,” Sora said at the same time as Tifa asked, “You ate an hour and a half ago.”

“All this positive energy has to come from somewhere,” Yuffie shrugged with her back turned as she walked into the kitchen. Sora followed her inside.

Tifa walked off down the hallway with all of the cabins and a moment later Leon followed. Not sure what else to do you walked up to the seat to the left of Cid and sat down, spinning slowly from side to side.

“So, Cid,” you started.

He grunted in acknowledgement.

“How long should it take to get to Wonderland?”

“We should get there sometime late tonight, but we’ll orbit ‘til the mornin’ and then ya’ll get off. If my warp drive wasn’t broken it would’a only taken a couple o’ hours.” He grumbled the last part quietly.

“Oh okay.” You guessed it had only been half an hour since you had boarded the ship. That meant it was around eleven o’clock. What were you supposed to do with your day? You found yourself looking curiously at the buttons on the control panel, many of them flashing at different speeds and in different colors. The large touch screen in front of Cid displayed a bunch of words that you weren’t sure you understood. You recognized the gauges reading the heat from the three engine rooms, and there was a strange looking gauge that you figured was a speedometer, but you weren’t sure what kind of measurement a light was.

Cid glanced over at you. “Nothin’ better to do, then?”

You shook your head sheepishly, blushing lightly, “No, not really.”

“Well, what do ya think about a crash course in drivin’ a gummi ship?”

“Really?” your eyes widened and a smile formed on your lips. “That would be great!”

“First, a little history,” Cid turned his chair so that he was facing you. You crossed your legs in front of you criss-cross-applesauce style, the chair just large enough to fit you comfortably, and then turned your chair to face him, too. “King Mickey was the first to build a gummi ship. They’re made from the meteors that fall ‘cause the door to a world has been opened. Now it’s possible to visit worlds ‘cause when the heartless first appeared years ago they destroyed the barriers between them. After he created the first, he taught me how they work and how to fly one, along with a couple of annoying chipmunks. There’s a drafter in Traverse Town that designs them, too.”

“So they haven’t been around that long, then,” you observed.

“No, they haven’t. Now onto basic mechanics. This one has three engines, each taking up about the size of one of the upstairs cabins. Those’re what give the ship enough lift to leave the atmosphere and enough lift to land smoothly. Once we’re out of the atmosphere we only need one engine to get around, but I usually fly with two to save time. If we’re really in a rush I’ll turn the third one on. We can look more at the engines later if yer still bored.” Cid sounded skeptical but you weren’t sure you would find anything else to do later. “Anyway, here are the basic controls.” He gestured at the section of the control panel directly in front of his chair. “This is how ya steer,” he pointed at the big controller sticking out at the center that resembled the control to steer an airplane, “The gages are above that. The most important one to check is the temperature gauge, although ya should be checkin’ them all. The fuel level’s always important, and there ain’t police around to ticket ya, but that doesn’t mean ya can’t go too fast.” He shot you a look as if to say when given the chance you would try to go too fast. 

“Okay, I get it!” you held your hands up, palms out. “I wouldn’t try to speed, Officer Highwind.” You laughed lightly. “I’d just be too nervous to try anything crazy.”

“Good to hear,” he nodded seriously and turned back to the control panel. “Under that is the throttle. The controls to the left of that are mostly for takeoff. The controls to the right are mostly for landing.” He went through the order in which you used the controls for takeoff, explaining what each did and why you needed to do things that way. It took longer than you thought it would, Cid had extensive knowledge that he was willing to share with you. You actually found it all very interesting, which somewhat surprised you. You hadn’t been very mechanical back on Destiny Islands, but your dad had handled any issues with the one car you had owned since high school. Now, sitting here and listening to Cid explain everything so simply, it made you wonder if you should’ve majored in engineering if you had gotten the chance to go to college. You would’ve been a freshman in the fall. “And ya should get to see me land tomorrow morning.” _Oops._ You had zoned out slightly toward the end of his talk. You didn’t think you would be flying a gummi ship during takeoff anytime soon, but you had gotten the gist of it. You figured you could pick up the little that you had missed next time Cid flew for takeoff.

“Okay,” you nodded in agreement. It had surprisingly taken Cid about an hour to explain all of that. You glanced behind you to see that the kitchen was empty. _Sora and Yuffie must’ve found something else to do._ You hadn’t realized they had left.

“The ship’s on autopilot now, set for Wonderland. I’m goin’ to grab somethin’ to eat.” He stood and made his way toward the kitchen. You could feel yourself getting hungry, too, so you followed him into the kitchen and while he made a sandwich you grabbed a yogurt from the fridge. You grabbed a spoon and gave Cid a quick, “See ya later,” before walking out of the kitchen. You paused for a moment, wondering which direction you should go. _That door leads to the engine rooms. The stairs lead to the cabins._ You looked at the door that Cloud had disappeared behind and grew curious. What was behind that door? Would he still be in there? You figured it had been long enough that he had probably moved, so you walked up to the door. It swung open easily and the room behind it astonished you. The room was walled on this side by the same walls that surrounded the rest of the insides of the ship, but the other walls were what looked like glass. The floor seemed to shine with the light of the stars. It was clean, unlike the control room that you could recognize was walked on often. A big turret gun was situated just beyond the glass on the side of the ship. You assumed the gun was bolted down to the ship below the glass. There was a seat similar to those in front of the controls in the other room with controls on this side of the glass in front of it. In the chair sat Cloud, staring out the huge windows.

He turned when he heard you open the door. When he saw it was you he turned back and continued staring out at the stars quietly. 

“This room is beautiful. It feels like I’m not even in the ship, like I’m just floating out there with the stars,” you voiced your first impression of the room.

“Its purpose might not be seen as something so beautiful,” Cloud spoke up.

You walked over to him with your yogurt asking, “What’s its purpose?” before eating another spoonful. 

“It’s the gun room. This is where we take down the ships that shoot at us.”

“That’s defense,” you replied. “That might make this room even more beautiful. Without it, if we were attacked, we wouldn’t have a chance. Sometimes, I think, those kinds of things need to be done. And I’ve been thinking a lot about that lately.”

“Mm,” Cloud grunted in agreement. He smirked lightly, satisfied by what you had said. You weren’t sure if he meant that he agreed with you, or if he was telling you that he had been thinking about that, too, or both, but you took it as a welcome gesture and sat down on the floor next to his chair. 

“Can I ask you something?” you bravely started another conversation halfway through your yogurt.

He nodded.

“Why are you always so quiet?”

He sighed and took a moment before answering. “You’re pretty quiet yourself.”

“That’s not really an answer,” you told him with a small grin on your face.

He thought a moment and then replied, “Sometimes words aren’t the best way to say things.”

You nodded, agreeing with his answer. “And other times?”

Cloud smirked lightly, glancing down at you from his chair. “You ask a lot of questions.”

Seeing that he wasn’t going to answer, you returned to looking out of the windows and quietly eating your yogurt. It wasn’t a strange quiet, though, it was a comfortable one. You felt as if it was only you and the stars, and the ship seemed to disappear around you.


	5. War

It took you a while to finish your yogurt. You kept getting lost in thought between bites and you would set it to the side to ponder something. You supposed that’s what happens when you are surrounded by stars. It was a thoughtful environment. When you did eventually finish your yogurt, you left the room, giving Cloud a smile on your way out before you realized he was lost in thought again. _Oh, well._

Out in the main seating area, it was quiet and empty. _That’s strange._ You knew the ship was on autopilot, but you figured someone would continue to watch it as it flew. _Apparently Cid is confident enough in his system that he doesn’t need to babysit it._ You walked up to the control panels and stood behind the chair at the center, looking out at the stars as you flew through them. There were lights on the control panel flashing every now and then, but you were sure they had been flashing while you sat there and Cid had instructed you on them, so you didn’t worry about them. After a moment, you turned and decided to climb the stairs to the cabins. You were curious what the others were doing.

The hallway was quiet. Most of the doors were shut, but one towards the end of the hallway, close to yours, was open. You could see flashes of light coming from it, and walked towards it cautiously. When you stood in front of the open door, you saw Sora sitting on his bed, right hand out. There was a small, short glow from his hand, and then his keyblade appeared. He looked over it once. After a moment it disappeared in the same glow it had appeared from.

You figured it was time to make your presence in his doorway known, so you lightly knocked on the frame. He looked up with wide eyes and his right hand fell to his side. His surprised expression quickly turned into a light smile when he recognized you. “Hey, [Name].”

“Hey, Sora,” you greeted before walking in and taking a seat next to him on the bed. “What are you doing?”

“I don’t know,” Sora’s smile turned sheepish. “Just trying to figure out how this works, I guess.”

You nodded understandingly, then held your right hand out and summoned your keyblade. There was the same glow you saw from Sora’s hand and then your keyblade appeared. It was almost entirely the same as his, except where his had a blue ring near the handle yours had a red ring, and the handle was a little bit thinner to accommodate your smaller hands. “Do you think-” you stopped, wondering how to ask the question that had just popped into your head. “Do you think someone else can hold a person’s keyblade?”

Sora’s head cocked to the side slightly and he answered, “I don’t know. We could try.”

You made your keyblade disappear and then slowly reached out for the one in Sora’s hand. You held it just below where he was holding it, and he let go of it. You brought it in front of you and turned it over, inspecting it. It wasn’t disappearing. It felt the same weight as yours and was comfortable in your hand. The handle was slightly bigger, but you were somewhat used to that considering you had shared all of your wooden swords with the boys when you were younger. “I wonder if someone that doesn’t wield a keyblade can hold it,” you said next.

Sora shrugged next to you. Footsteps could be heard down the hall and Sora turned to look at his open doorway. The keyblade in your hand glowed and then your hand fisted around nothing. You turned to look, too, and saw Leon walk by.

Sora sighed and fell back onto his bed. “There’s nothing to do on this ship.”

“I think it’s almost dinner time,” you said thoughtfully. “That’ll be something to do.”

Sora sighed again and you giggled at his unusual lack of enthusiasm. “You and food,” the brunette said.

“What about me and food?” you asked feigning offense. “What does that mean?”

“Sometimes I think there’s a fat kid inside of you,” Sora told you.

“What!?” you started to laugh loudly. “I’m pretty sure that’s not a compliment.”

Sora smirked lightly and lifted his arms to hide his face. “It wasn’t.”

“Hey!” you punched him lightly in the shoulder. He didn’t respond, so you jumped up to sit further on the bed where you could lean your back against the pristine white wall. You pulled your knees to your chest and looked down at Sora. He looked tired.

“Are you all right?” you asked him. “You haven’t been this tired since that night we tee-peed Tidus’ house.”

He let his arms fall back to his sides. “I haven’t been sleeping the greatest,” he admitted. “But there’s just so much to think about instead of falling asleep.”

“I know how you feel,” you told him. “Maybe you should take a nap before dinner, then?”

“Maybe…” the brunette sat up.

“Alright, well, I’ll let you sleep, then,” you started to scooch off the bed so you could leave.

“Wait,” Sora turned to look at you. “They’re okay, right? Riku and Kairi are okay?”

You stared into his worried eyes before settling back against the wall and answering with determination. “I know they are. We just have to focus on getting to them.” It was strange for you to see the brunette so worried. It only happened on rare occasions, but you knew it hadn’t taken much to set him back onto his path of positivity. This time shouldn’t be any different.

“Right,” he smiled at your answer. “We’d know if they were… hurt, I think. Hopefully they’re together. I’m not sure Kairi can handle all of this on her own.”

“I think Kairi can be stronger than you know,” you told him and moved to get off the bed again so he could rest. _Of course he is worried about Kairi._ He had not seen the strength she carried with her, like you had, though. She had broken down to you once about how she would sometimes remember her grandmother and wonder if she was out there, and about how much she wished she had a family. It was the only time she had really talked about it with anyone since she had gotten to the island, and you had reassured her that you guys were her family now. She had hugged you tightly, tears still in her eyes, and thanked you for being her friend. She hadn’t broken down since. You knew she’d find her way back to her friends- her family again.

“[Name],” Sora spoke up again with a smile. “You don’t have to leave. If you don’t want to, that is. It’s nice to have you here. Company distracts me from thinking about Kairi or Riku out there by themselves.”

“Okay,” you nodded once, your eyes looking over into his wide-open and vulnerable ones, and he maneuvered so that he was lying down and you were sitting the same way you had been between him and the wall. “Do you remember that one sleepover we all had and you ended up rolling over everyone in your sleeping bag while you were sleeping?” you started to laugh.

“When I told you to distract me, I didn’t mean tell the embarrassing stories I buried where I wouldn’t think about them again!” He smiled as he kicked his leg out at your shins. 

“You should be more specific, then,” you smiled at him, “I’ve already prepared myself to share with you five of your most embarrassing stories.”

“Not cool,” Sora yawned and turned to lie on his side, facing away from you. 

You continued to tell your stories, the next one being a particularly long one about the bad day Sora had had in high school. He started it off with forgetting his backpack, which you always wondered about. How could a high school student forget their backpack when they were going to school? You asked him this but he only mumbled, irritated at you, before swinging an arm back and swatting the spot next to you. He had missed apparently. You continued to tell the story about how on the same day he had tripped while playing volleyball during gym. He was jumping up to hit and stumbled. Unfortunately, Kairi was on the other side of the net and Sora fell right on top of her. Poor girl never saw it coming. You knew this because you had been next to her, on her team. She wasn’t quite as athletic as you were. This didn’t sway her more towards your view of physical activity at all. She had stared wide-eyed up at Sora with a reddening face, and the poor brunette on top of her, who you were sure had been trying to show off, was sputtering apologies, stuttering so much it was hard to understand him. Sora didn’t respond to that one, so you moved onto the next tale. A story about the time he had fallen into the fountain in the center of town. After that you realized he was asleep, his breathing deep and even. You’d have to save the rest of your embarrassing tales for next time.

Right now, though, your eyes were beginning to grow heavy. You had entirely agreed with Sora when he had said there were too many important things to think about instead of falling asleep. And with traveling to another world for the first time on your mind last night, you had gotten little sleep. You were worried about your friends, and worried about getting to them. You worried that Sora and yourself might not be the best keyblade wielders; that the two of you wouldn’t be able to save the worlds you needed to save. But now, here with Sora, you realized you and your friends had always been able to do anything you put your mind to. This should be no different. You would get through this and all come out stronger on the other side.

\----------

KNOCK, KNOCK.

Your head lifted with a start, and you jerked it back so far that you slammed it into the wall behind you. “Ow,” you yelped. Your neck hurt from it bending forward so much for so long. It felt good to stretch it as you looked to the side to the open doorway where Leon stood. There was a slight smirk on his face, and you assumed it had something to do with you waking up and hitting your head.

“Dinner’s ready,” he said simply before walking away.

Sora was still asleep, but now he was on his back, your feet stuck under him. You wiggled your toes and said, “Sora! Dinner’s ready, c’mon.”

His blue eyes fluttered open and he sat up. “How long did I sleep?” 

“I don’t know,” you blushed lightly. “I fell asleep, too.”

Sora grunted in amusement. “Of course you did. And since there’s food waiting I’m sure you want me to hurry up.” He slowly stretched his arms above his head and yawned.

“Yes, please,” you said, rubbing the spot on the back of your head that had made impact with the wall. Your hair should hide the small goose egg that was forming, but it still hurt. You scooched to the end of his bed and stood, then stretched. Sora took his time getting out of bed and you stood in the doorway with your arms crossed.

You waited patiently for him to stand next to you and then the two of you made your way down to the kitchen. A table seemed to have risen from the floor between a set of chairs in the main seating room. It was a little bigger than your group needed, but you were glad that you wouldn’t have to hold your plate in your lap while you ate whatever had been made for dinner. Everyone else was already gathered around the table with plates full of macaroni and cheese with hot dogs. Your stomach rumbled as you smelled the warm food and you quickly made your way to the kitchen to make yourself a plate. You took it and sat next to Tifa at the emptier end of the table. 

“What have you been up to?” she asked you.

“I know the basics of flying a gummi ship,” you told her with a shrug and a smile.

“You’ve been busy with Cid, then,” Tifa smiled. “Yuffie and I were playing card games, but when I beat her at war she got a little upset, so I’m not sure what she ended up doing after she stormed out.”

Yuffie rolled her eyes from the other side of Tifa. “You cheated. Nobody beats the Great Ninja Yuffie at war!”

You laughed. “Well, I’d like to try. How about a game after dinner?”

“You’re on!” Yuffie smiled at you.

“Yuffie’s the reigning champion at war, but Tifa beats her half the time,” Leon added from across the table from the girls. “I think I’d have to put my money on Yuffie.”

“Challenge accepted,” you smirked at Leon.

“My money’s on [Name]!” Sora shouted.

You hadn’t realized the whole table had started listening to the conversation.

“I’d like to play again,” Tifa said. “That way there will be witnesses and you can’t say that I cheated,” she looked accusingly at Yuffie.

“We’ll just have another tournament,” Cid spoke up, his plate cleared of food. “That way everyone gets to play. I’ll referee, since there’s an odd number.”

You and Yuffie had been separated in the bracket system so that you wouldn’t face each other until the championship game. You had two games until then, and you played against Leon in the first one. He and Cloud did not seem too excited about the tournament, and you positioned yourself across from the brunette at the table. Next to you were Yuffie playing Tifa, and on the other side of them was Cloud playing Sora. Cid walked around the table, watching the games. He would occasionally walk off to stare out of the front window of the ship.

Your game with Leon was moving along quickly, and it didn’t take much time for you to gain the upper hand. You had almost twice the cards he did by the time the two of you ran out of your first batch of cards.

“Maybe you can beat Yuffie,” Leon grumbled from across the table.

You smiled, “Have you always been this bad at this game?”

“Ha. Ha.” Leon feigned laughter, a frown still on his face.

You shook your head at him with a smile before quickly taking the rest of his cards and winning. Your game was the first to finish, and you watched Sora beat Cloud, the blonde giving away his cards easily, disinterested in the game. Then Yuffie beat Tifa, rubbing it in her face immediately. Tifa huffed at the other girl but didn’t protest. You faced off against Sora next, while Yuffie sat out and waited for the winner to play her. Cid divided the cards between you and Sora, and you started the game. It was neck-in-neck for a while before you finally began making headway. Then, suddenly, Sora started to lose all of his cards very quickly. He groaned as you grabbed the last one. 

Now it was just you and Yuffie. Sora stood from his chair and Yuffie walked over to take it. She extended a hand to you before she sat down.

“Good luck,” she said while shaking your hand, “You’re going to need it.”

“We’ll see,” you smiled at her.

You quickly realized that Leon had been right. Yuffie was very good at war. It was a game of luck and she must have had a lot of it, because in the first minute you were down to ten cards. The short-haired girl was smirking at you from across the table while you stared at the few cards in your hand with concern. Sora was making upset noises every time you lost a card now and you looked over at him embarrassedly. _Oh, well. I tried. Yuffie is the champion, so it wouldn’t be terrible if I lost to her._ She laid down her next card and you followed it with an ace. She huffed as you grabbed them. The next card she laid was a king. Yuffie grinned as she set it down. You dropped another ace onto the table and smiled with surprise. Two aces in a row was a pretty lucky coincidence. Yuffie was frowning now and the two of you continued, but this time you started winning your cards back. It took longer than you would’ve liked, but soon you were winning and Yuffie was left with only a few cards. You both laid down an ace at the same time and laid out the tie breaker. Yuffie groaned as she set her last card on the table. It would be over now if she lost this tie breaker. Sora was staring excitedly at the game from the seat next to you, cheering you on. You took a deep breath before the two of you flipped over your last cards. Your hand held a four and you deflated. No way could you win with that. Suddenly, Yuffie let out a cry of despair and you saw a three in her hand.

“[Name] won!” Sora shouted with excitement. “I won the bet! Leon, you owe me… something!”

You watched Leon roll his eyes at Sora and reply with, “Sure I do.”

You turned back to Yuffie, “Good game. Do you guys have card tournaments often?”

“Thanks,” she smiled sheepishly, still upset with her loss. “Yeah, every once in a while. It usually doesn’t happen until we all get really bored.”

“Gotcha,” you yawned. “What time is it?”

“It’s nine-thirty,” Cid said.

“Oh,” you stood and stretched. “What time do we have to be up tomorrow? I think I should get to bed.”

“I’ll wake you up around eight,” Tifa told you before returning to her conversation with Sora and Leon at the other end of the table.

“Alright,” you yawned again and walked toward the staircase that led to the cabins. It hadn’t taken long for you to get tired. Maybe it was the fact that you were staring at stars whenever you looked out the window. Or maybe you were still shocked that you were flying in a gummi ship to another world. That was certainly difficult to think about. Whatever it was made it easy for you to walk dazedly to your cabin before quickly getting ready for bed and falling asleep as soon as your head hit the pillow.


	6. Wondering in Wonderland

_You were surrounded by darkness. There was nothing else. Just you and darkness. And then there was a voice. It seemed to echo in your mind._

_“So much to do, so little time… Take your time. Do not be afraid.”_

_“I don’t know if I can do this. There’s so much to be afraid of!” you were panicked as you thought of all the responsibility on your shoulders. Everything depended on you and your newfound keyblade._

_“You are not alone,” the voice said gently, and you could almost hear a small smile in its tone. Was it amused at how worried and anxious you were? “You have new friends that will support you, and old ones that will continue to help.”_

_You were quiet a moment as you thought about his words. Then said, “And Sora and I, we’re a team. We’ll get through this together.”_

_“The two of you will separate physically soon. But you know that that cannot separate your hearts.”_

_His words scared you._ Sora is going to be separated from me!? _You weren’t sure you could handle all of this without him next to you._

_“You can,” the voice replied to your thoughts. “You will. Prepare yourself, now. It is time.”_

Knock. Knock, Knock.

_“Time for what?” you called into the darkness._

Knock, knock, knock. “[Name]!”

You sat up in your bed, your pillow was on the floor next to the bed and your sheets were tangled around you. The mysterious voice from your dreams echoed in your head, still. _It is time... It is time… It is time…_

“[Name]!” Tifa called from the other side of your closed door.

“I’m up!” you called back quickly. You halfway fixed your sheets and threw your pillow back onto the bed before getting ready for the day. It didn’t take long and soon you were downstairs enjoying breakfast with the others, your plate full of bacon, eggs, and toast.

“As soon as everyone’s done eating we’ll leave the ship,” Tifa announced. 

You noticed Leon glancing at you and Sora as he ate his breakfast, a frown on his face. You assumed it had something to do with the two of you going on your first mission. _Does he still not think we’re ready?_ You decided to ignore that and eat quickly. Everyone else ate even more quickly and you were the last person to take care of your dishes. Everyone convened in the control room again. You learned that Cid always stayed with his ship, and that the rest of you would split up to enter Wonderland, just in case. You would go with Sora, Donald, and Goofy. The four of you would enter from the main port and the others would enter from a more private location, in case the element of surprise was necessary. 

You and Sora left the ship, which resulted in the two of you falling down a long passage full of clocks. You had screamed at first, but you realized you weren’t falling very quickly and stopped. Donald and Goofy were at the bottom already. Sora and yourself landed softly on the ground and greeted them.

“Oh, my fur and whiskers!” you heard from behind you. You turned and saw a rabbit running for the only exit out of the room. “I’m late, I’m late, I’m late!”

He hurried away, and all four pairs of eyes followed him.

“The queen! She’ll have my head for sure!” he shouted before rounding a corner and disappearing.

“The only way to go is to follow him,” you pointed out.

“Alright, let’s go!” Donald led the group down the hallway and you all came upon a large door. After a short moment it opened by itself, followed by a smaller door behind it, and a smaller door behind that. You carefully followed the others through; wary of whatever was going on in this strange place.

The rabbit, much smaller now, quickly exited this room through a door by the floor on the other side of the room. You all walked up to it and Sora knelt down in front of it, examining it. You could see a face around the door handle now.

“How did he get so small?” Sora wondered.

“No, you’re simply too big,” the door answered matter-of-factly, a bored expression on his face. You jumped back in surprise _. Animals talking and now door handles?_ You thought maybe the chair in the corner would strike up a conversation next.

Donald yelped his surprise. “It talks!”

The door yawned. “Must you be so loud? You woke me up.”

“Good morning,” Goofy replied politely.

“Good night. I need a bit more sleep,” the door told him.

“Wait!” Sora knelt down again. “How do we grow small?”

“Why don’t you try the bottle, over there?” the door answered before yawning again.

You all looked behind you and a table grew from the floor, a bottle on it that read “Drink me.”

You turned back to the door curiously and found that he was already asleep again. You gathered around the table with everyone else.

“We just have to drink this, right?” Donald gestured at the bottle with a wing and Goofy shrugged.

“What are we waiting for?” Sora grabbed the bottle.

“Wait, Sora!” you reached out and tried to stop him, but it was too late. He drank from it quickly and set it back on the table. There was only time for him to look at you before he started shrinking.

“Sora!” you gasped as he shrunk to the height of your shin.

Donald and Goofy looked at each other, shrugged, and then both drank from the bottle. They shrunk quickly.

“C’mon, [Name]!” Sora called from below you.

You grabbed the bottle, deciding that you might as well join them. _Hopefully this isn’t permanent._ Shrinking was a strange feeling. Your body seemed to tremble as everything shortened and you felt fizzy. Now you were staring at the others the way you were used to staring at them; Sora a little taller than you, Donald shorter, and Goofy much taller.

You didn’t have time to stare, however. Shadows darted across the floor and suddenly the four of you were surrounded. Luckily, all of the heartless were the same size as you. You would’ve had difficulty fighting them if you were the size of their feet. You all quickly got through them, and then a second wave appeared, full of the ones that looked like small soldiers. It didn’t take long to get through those, either. 

A little out of breath, you looked over at Sora. “What do we do now?”

Sora shrugged and looked back at the door he had been talking to earlier. It was snoring softly and had somehow managed to sleep through the battle. There was an open doorway to the left of that, and that’s the direction Sora started walking. The three of you followed him and came out into the courtyard of a garden. Guards surrounded the short walkway, and they were in fact cards, just as Cloud had said. They separated as your group walked by and you watched the rabbit you had seen earlier run up some stairs to stand on a pedestal on the left of the courtyard. In the middle stood what must have been the Queen of Hearts looking down from her thrown with a frown at a young girl in a blue dress with long blonde hair. The rabbit blew a horn before announcing that court was in session.

“I’m on trial?!” the girl was scared and confused as she questioned the rabbit. “But why?”

The rabbit ignored her, turning to face the queen instead and announcing, “Her majesty, the queen of hearts, presiding!”

“This girl is the culprit,” the queen said, pounding her fists on the wood in front of her thrown. “There’s no doubt about it. And the reason is… because I say so, that’s why!”

Your eyes widened and you watched Sora take a small step forward with his fists clenched.

“That is so unfair!” the girl pled with the queen.

“Well, have you anything to say in your defense?” the queen crossed her arms, one hand holding a small stick with a heart on the end of it.

“Of course! I’ve done absolutely nothing wrong,” the girl crossed her arms defiantly. “You may be queen, but I’m afraid that doesn’t give you the right to be so… so mean!”

The rabbit to the left looked so shocked he might faint and the queen frowned down at the girl with a glare.

“Silence!” the queen shouted as she pounded the wood in front of her again. “You dare defy me?”

“Hey, guys,” Sora spoke up. “We should help her out!”

“We’re outsiders, so wouldn’t that be muddling?” Goofy asked.

“Meddling!” Donald corrected him.

“Oh, yeah,” Goofy nodded. “And that’s against the rules.”

You stared worriedly at the girl in front of you. _But they can’t do that to her. Surely situations like this must be a loophole._

“The defendant is found… guilty as charged!” the queen shouted and pointed her heart-stick at the young girl. “For the crimes of assault and attempted theft of my heart. Off with her head!”

You and Sora gasped at the same time.

“No! No! Oh, please!” the girl pleaded.

Sora stepped forward as the guards attempted to crowd around the girl. “Hold it right there!”

You followed Sora as the guards cleared your path up to the girl and the queen.

“Who are you?” the queen demanded. “How dare you interfere with my court!”

“Excuse me,” Sora stepped away from your group, “but we know who the real culprit is.”

“Uh-huh, it’s the heart-” Goofy shut his mouth before he could say too much.

Sora glanced at him before returning his gaze to the queen and continuing, “Anyway, she’s not the one you’re looking for.”

“That’s nonsense,” the queen waved her hand, physically discounting what Sora had said. “Have you any proof?”

“Uh,” Sora looked sheepish.

The queen nodded to her guards and they grabbed the girl and locked her in a cage next to the queen’s pedestal.

“Bring me evidence of Alice’s innocence! Fail, and it’s off with your heads!” she proclaimed. 

The four of you looked at each other and you sighed. How would you all find evidence of the heartless?

“Come on,” Sora moved in the direction of an open archway that looked like it led into a forest.

You didn’t know what else you could do so you followed after him with Donald and Goofy. Sora stopped suddenly on the other side and it didn’t take you long to see why. A grinning cat’s head was floating around in front of him. You watched as it landed on a large stump and then a body formed on top of it, disconnected from the head and standing on it. You gasped as it picked its head up and placed it back where it belonged, still grinning at all of you.

“Who are you!?” Donald was astonished at the thing.

“Who, indeed?” the cat grinned and answered with another question. “Poor Alice. Soon to lose her head, and she’s not guilty of a thing!”

You frowned at the pink and purple striped cat.

“Hey, if you know who the culprit is, tell us!” Sora told him.

“The Cheshire Cat has all the answers- but doesn’t always tell. The answer, the culprit, the cat all lie in darkness.”

He began to disappear and Sora shouted, “Wait!”

“They’ve already left the forest, I won’t tell which exit,” the cat’s voice said even though its body was gone. “There are four pieces of evidence in all. Three are a cinch to find. The fourth is tricky. Big reward if you find them all.”

“Should we trust him?” Donald asked.

The cat suddenly reappeared and you jumped.

“To trust, or not to trust? I trust you’ll decide!” it said before disappearing for good.

You sighed and looked at the others. _This place sure is weird_. “Well, now what?”

Donald appeared to be thinking while Sora and Goofy glanced around the forest you were in. You heard footsteps on the dirt and turned around to see the others joining you.

“I think he’s right,” Tifa said as you turned to face them. “We’ve been looking around the area and we’ve found three little boxes that contain evidence pointing to the heartless. There could be a fourth one that we didn’t see.”

“Oh,” Donald said. “How about we split up and gather the evidence?”

“Alright,” Leon nodded. “Sora, Donald, Goofy, you grab the one we saw back there in the forest. Tifa and Yuffie, you grab the one we saw on the other side of the trees. Cloud, grab the one on top of the stove in the room with the talking door. [Name], we’ll look for the fourth.”

You immediately grew anxious because you were going to be separated from Sora. You glanced at the brunette, but he was already talking with Donald and Goofy to Yuffie about how to get to their box of evidence. He managed to catch your eye briefly and gave you a reassuring nod. He would be fine and so would everyone else. _We’re just gathering some boxes._ _We’ll be fine._ You returned the nod before looking back at Leon.

“Okay,” you told him. “Where should we start looking?”

“Let’s look in that room again, but I think we’re going to have to get to it from a different direction than that little doorway on the floor. I thought I saw something up higher, maybe if we climb that tree we can see something,” Leon told you.

You looked up at the tree he was looking up into and thought about its height. You had climbed palm trees back on destiny islands before, but none of them were ever that tall. It had been a while since you had climbed a tree, too. Hopefully it was like riding a bike. Leon walked over to the tree and you followed him, noticing that the branches weren’t spaced too far apart. You could do this. At least, that’s what you kept telling yourself. Leon gestured for you to go first and you grabbed the bottommost branch and pulled yourself up.

It was a good thing you had never stopped trying to keep up actively with the boys, otherwise you didn’t think you would be able to keep at a pace steady enough for Leon to not get annoyed with you. There was one point you had to jump to reach the next branch, but your fingers grasped it without slipping and you pulled yourself up again. It was a good thing the mythril you were wearing for defense was light or that might’ve been much more difficult. Branch after branch you climbed and at the top there was a small landing where many thick branches had grown over each other, all covered in leaves. You stepped as far out as you dared, looking for any sign of a way into that bizarre room with the talking door. Leon pulled himself up right behind you, but stayed close to the trunk of the tree, telling you that you’d be able to go out farther by yourself and see more. You were just about to huff and turn around for help when a dark corner high in the trees across from you caught your eye.

“Oh,” you pointed at it, “I think I see it!”

Leon looked to where you were pointing and he nodded, “I think that’s what we’re looking for.” His eyes searched the area around it and you presumed he was looking for a path. 

“If I jump from this tree to that one, can you follow me?” he said suddenly, catching you off guard.

You looked at the gap between the leaves and thought about it. “I- I think so.”

Leon’s eyebrows rose skeptically.

“Yes, I can,” you nodded more confidently this time.

Leon looked at you for a moment and then sighed, “Alright. I’ll go first.”

You nodded once more and watched as he jumped across the gap easily. You watched him land and calculated the distance in your head. He made it look as though he could jump twice that distance easily. The gap was about the size of your height. You would have to make sure to get a running start.

You stepped back and took a breath before sprinting to the edge. You leapt forward and glanced down briefly to see the ground dizzyingly far below you. Your eyes met Leon’s just as your foot caught the edge of the thick branch and caught traction. Your forward momentum pushed you forward still and your second foot missed the branch. You flailed your arms once, but just as Leon caught your arm your second foot caught hold on the branch. You looked up at him with wide eyes and his determined face turned into pursed lips.

“Try not to look down next time,” he told you quickly and let go of your arm.

A sigh escaped you as you stared up at the sunlight in the leaves above you with a small smile. _That was close. Don’t look down, now, [Name]._ You took a deep breath before following Leon towards the dark tunnel in the leaves.

You stepped from branch to branch carefully now, but caught up to Leon quickly enough. He led you through the short tunnel and stopped just before leaving it.

“Is it the room?” you asked curiously. “With the talking doorknob?”

He nodded and you looked past the brunette to see that the ground fell away and you were looking at a 20 foot drop onto a precarious faucet handle. There was a pink package on a cupboard nearby, however, and you assumed that’s what held the evidence. That Cheshire Cat sure was a strange being, gathering the evidence and then hiding it for all of you to search for anyway.

“Okay,” Leon turned back around to face you. “We’ll land on that faucet, and then I’ll give you a boost to that cupboard over there.”

“A boost?” I looked at him, confused.

“It’s too far for me too jump, and definitely too far for you to jump, but if I can throw you-”

“Throw me!?” you interrupted him with gasp. “You want to throw me across a gap that you can’t even jump?”

“I know, it’s risky, but it’s the only way to get across. The power of your jump combined with my throw should be enough to get you across. If we get down there and think it’s too much we won’t go through with it, okay?” Leon asked.

Your head turned to look past him at the pink box and then the gap between you and it.

You sighed and your gaze turned back to him. “Alright.”

“I’ll jump down first,” he told you before turning and letting himself step off the edge.

_Goodness. What am I doing?_ You questioned yourself as you watched him land carefully on the faucet. Shaking your head slightly, you focused on the other side of the handle and stepped down.

Your feet found it quickly and you felt your hair that you had put into a ponytail this morning land on your back when you cushioned your fall with your knees. You looked over at Leon who was surveying the gap again. Looking back at it yourself, it didn’t look much different than it had up higher. 

“I don’t know,” Leon glanced over at you with his arms crossed. “Maybe-”

“Let’s do it,” you told him.

He looked over at you slightly surprised, and then his face turned serious again. “[Name]…”

“We need that evidence, right?” you pointed at the pink box and he nodded. “Okay. I can do this.”

Leon pursed his lips, “Are you sure?”

You nodded, eyes looking back at him determinedly to show him that you meant it.

Leon sighed before lowering himself so that he was in somewhat of a squat in front of you, with his arms close to the ground and fingers intertwined in front of him to create a small platform.

_I guess my foot goes there._ You didn’t give yourself any more time to think and stepped forward instead. Your foot fit into his hands and he grabbed onto your boot tightly.

“Ready?” he asked.

You focused on the top of the cabinet in front of you. “Yes.”

His hands went down before they went up and at the last moment you pushed off, reaching for the cabinet. It was only a moment but it felt like the longest time. You advanced on the shelf and realized halfway there that you might not make it. You reached out farther, swinging your second arm out in front of you. You focused on the corner of the shelf and at the last moment your hands made contact. You held on with all the strength you had, bringing your feet in front of you so that your body would not slam into the side of the cabinet. You grunted as you hit, but held on. You took a deep breath before pulling yourself up and turning to look at Leon with a small smile.

“There. That wasn’t so bad.”

Leon replied with a small smirk. You turned to grab the box and it felt lighter in your hands than you thought it would. When you turned back the Cheshire Cat appeared next to Leon, grinning and curled as if it was laying on something even though it was floating in the air next to the brunette’s head.

“Well, look what you’ve found. Nice going,” it said to you, ignoring the man next to it.

Leon took a threatening step towards the cat and you spoke up. “Wait. I don’t think he would hurt us. Now we can save Alice.”

Leon glanced at you skeptically but didn’t make any more advances toward the cat.

“Don’t be so sure!” The cat’s tail swung lazily next to it. “She may be innocent, but what about you?”

Your eyebrows furrowed. This cat’s riddles did not help you much. “I don’t understand. We’re only trying to help,” you told him.

“What do you mean?” Leon asked, his crossed arms showing his irritation.

“I won’t tell…” the cat glanced at Leon before returning his gaze to you, “but I’ll give you something.”

A clear crystal formed in front of you, glowing from the inside. It branched out to form something similar to what you had seen when looking at pictures of snowflakes. The air around it grew very cold before it suddenly burst into what looked like diamond dust and coated your face. You had winced when it had exploded, your eyes shut tight, and when you opened them the cat was gone.

“What was that?” you asked the air where the cat was previously. Leon’s face was scrunched up as if he was trying to figure something out. His eyebrows were knitted together as he looked at you.

You lifted your hand to see if there was any dust on your face, but there wasn’t. You brought your hand back down quickly, but you felt a shot of energy go through your arm before something shot from your hand and landed in the wall by Leon’s side with a thud.

“What the hell was that!?” you jumped back and held your hands together by your chest so as to keep whatever the heck just happened from happening again. The box you had been holding in your one hand fell and landed without bouncing at your feet.

Leon was staring at the thing that had pierced the wall. “Ice.”

“What?” your eyes were wide as you stared at the pointy thing that came from your hand.

“You shot ice at me,” Leon turned to you again with a look of curiosity. “He must have awakened your magic abilities.”

“Magic abilities?” you stared at Leon in bewilderment.

Leon shrugged, “Most people have at least a little bit of magic ability. Mine is small but it helps me fight with my weapon when I need it.”

“Oh,” you said, eyes still wide.

“My guess is you have a large magical ability, being a keyblade wielder and all.”

“Okay,” you chewed on your bottom lip as you thought about it. You held your hand in front of you and focused on creating a crystal like you had shot at Leon. For a moment nothing happened. Then frost formed on your fingertips, though your hand wasn’t cold, and a small, diamond-shaped piece of ice materialized just above the palm of your hand. You opened your hand flat and it turned to what you thought was snow and fell toward the ground. “Huh,” you grunted attentively at your empty hand.

“Come on,” Leon told you, “The others are probably waiting.”

You looked away from your hand and to the brunette. “Okay. Right,” you grabbed the box from at your feet and lifted the lid curiously. Inside was a collection of objects that had been marked and cut by claws. Even the inside of the box itself had been marked. 

“Walk over to the other side of the fireplace and jump down from there,” Leon told you. “I’ll meet you there.”

You nodded before following his orders.

He was waiting for you to jump down before you had gotten there. You did, and the two of you walked through the doorway to the left of the sleeping doorknob and found the rest of your group in the entrance to the courtyard, three pink boxes on the ground in front of them.

Sora immediately caught your eye. He was on the edge of the group, grinning as he formed an ice crystal in his hand and then shot it into the shrubbery away from everyone else. You grinned to yourself and narrowed your gaze onto the crystal he was forming in his hand now. You raised your arm and pointed an open hand in the direction of slightly in front of the spiky-haired brunette. He shot his from his hand and you did, too. They met halfway to the leaves, and a small explosion resulted. Sora’s wide blue eyes turned to find yours and you smiled at him, waving once.

“Did you do that?” he asked you.

You walked over to him. “Yeah, I guess the Cheshire Cat ‘awakened my magical ability.’” You made air quotes with your hands. “At least that’s what Leon said. The cat must’ve awakened yours, too.”

“Hm,” Sora’s eyebrows rose. “Yeah, I guess. I almost skewered Donald.”

You laughed; glad you weren’t the only one that had had issues with the awakening. “I almost did the same to Leon!”

Sora looked over at you and then burst out laughing.

“Sora!” you heard Tifa call his name and you both turned.

“You have to present the evidence to the queen,” she told him, “because you are the one who told her we would get it. We’ll wait here. Donald, Goofy, and [Name] will go with you.”

“Okay,” Sora nodded, and the four of you each grabbed one of the pink boxes. You were still holding onto the one you had grabbed earlier so all you had to do was follow the three of them into the courtyard.

“Do you have your evidence?” the queen asked your group with her nose stuck in the air when you stepped up to the pedestal in front of her. 

You all placed your boxes on the counter in front of you.

“Well,” the queen sighed, frowning at the pink boxes. “That’s certainly a lot of evidence but I am still not convinced. Cards! Bring forth my evidence!”

A two-hearted red card set another pink box next to the other four in front of you.

“Checking all of them would be a waste of time,” the queen said monotonously. Suddenly five cards stepped in front of you and took the evidence before quickly scrambling themselves and setting the boxes back down. You had no idea which box was yours now.

“Pick one to present to me. I’ll decide who’s guilty based on that evidence.”

“Wait!” you called out, thinking of all the hard work that had gone into gathering your box. “That’s not fair!”

“I’ve heard that before,” the queen said simply before lifting her nose again. “You object again, and you will lose your head!”

You huffed, exasperated. “What do we do?”

“All we can do is pick one,” Sora said with a shrug.

“Which one?” Donald asked, looking from box to box with concern.

Sora turned back to look at the pink cubes again. He brought a hand to his chin and thought for a moment before stepping forward and grabbing one. “This one.”

“You’re sure?” you asked him.

He glanced at you, but before he could answer the queen spoke up again. “No second chances! Now open it.”

A heartless appeared out of it before quickly disappearing. You summoned your keyblade just in case.

“What was that!?” the queen cried.

“That was the evidence,” Sora told her. “Alice is innocent!”

“Silence!” she told him, and you winced at her volume. “I am the law here. Article 29: Anyone who defies the queen is guilty!”

“What?” you gasped quietly and took a step back. Your wide eyes were trained on the mad queen.

“That’s crazy!” Donald shouted.

“Seize them at once!” the queen ignored him.

The shrubs and the platform you were on shrunk into the ground and the courtyard opened up. In the center sat a large crank now and as one of the cards cranked it Alice’s cage- covered in a red curtain- was hauled upward toward the queen. The queen pointed the heart on the end of her stick at your group and suddenly her card-men were diving at you.

You jumped and dove out of the way, then claimed a more stable stance, your keyblade at the ready. You didn’t have much time, though; as more card men had found you. You swung, but tried to think of a way to get to Alice as you fought off the cards. It was easy to knock them away, but they didn’t stay down for long and there was so many of them. _The crank. If we can somehow lower her down we can get her out of that cage and to safety._

You turned to see that the rest of your group had joined the fight. You tried to fight your way through the cards to the crank but it was taking too long.

“The crank!” you called out. “We need to get Alice down!”

Sora and Yuffie were fighting between you and the crank. You watched as they both glanced at you and then focused their attention on getting to the crank. You were closest to Alice so you began fighting your way in that direction.

You noticed that Yuffie and Sora were attacking the crank, rather than cranking it so the cage came down like you had thought they would, but as long as Alice came down you weren’t going to complain about how it worked out. 

“Duck,” you heard a stern voice call from behind you. You did as it said and rolled to the side just as a giant sword clashed with all of the cards in front of you. Quickly, you jumped back to your feet and saw Cloud had knocked all of the cards away. The two of you easily made it to where the cage would be when it lowered and defended the spot while Yuffie and Sora finished hacking at the crank.

The structure holding the crank exploded into splinters and you watched as the cage lowered. The queen, who had been sitting on her thrown watching the battle, leaned over the edge of her pedestal to watch as it fell. The curtain swung back, but the cage was empty.

“She must’ve gotten kidnapped while we were fighting,” Donald observed, his eyebrows knitted together.

“You fools!” the queen bellowed at the few cards left standing. “Find the one who’s behind this! I don’t care how!”

Your eyes found Cloud’s. “What do we do now?”

“We should look for her, too. Maybe she’s still around here somewhere, and if she isn’t we might still be able to find clues,” he replied.

“Alright,” Leon’s voice stopped everyone else’s worried talk about what had happened. “We need to look, too. I think we should all start in the forest. All of the cards ran in the other direction.”

There were no objections as everyone walked back into the forest. Everyone scattered, looking for anything that would help tell where Alice had gone. You walked over to a grove of large flowers, their buds above your head. 

“Hello, little flower,” you heard a voice call from above you.

You tilted your head up to see that one of the large red daisies had turned its bud down to look at you. There was a round face in the middle of its petals.

“H-hello,” you said shyly, backing away some so that you weren’t looking directly up.

“Such strange petals you have,” the flower said, inspecting your form-fitting athletic wear. “You must not be from around here.”

“No,” you told her, “I’m not. But I’m looking for someone who is. Have you seen a girl named Alice? Long blonde h- umm, petals on top and blue ones toward the bottom?”

“Hmm,” the flower thought for a moment.

“Who are you talking to?” Another bud to the left of the red one turned to look at what was going on. She was a light purple, and frowned when she saw you. “Oh, another weed.”

The red flower glanced at the purple one as if she wished that the other flower had minded her own business, but she asked her anyway, “Have you seen a little blue flower come through here?”

“No,” the purple flower frowned as she answered in a bored tone. “But there was a scrawny little weed. She was causing quite a commotion, what with the shadows she brought through here.”

“Was she wearing a blue-” you quickly stopped and corrected yourself to talk more like the flowers. “Did she have blue petals?”

“Yes,” the purple flower nodded. “But she didn’t even have a scent. At least you have a scent.”

“Which way did she go?” you asked eagerly, almost interrupting her.

“That way,” the flower pointed with one of its leaves at a doorway above the pond at the front of the forest. You weren’t sure how you’d get up there, but at least now you knew where to go.

“Thank you,” you told the purple flower, who only turned around with a frown.

The red flower sighed, “Sorry about her. The other flowers don’t see things the way I do usually.”

“It’s alright,” you told her with a small smile. “Thanks for your help.”

You turned to walk away, but paused, then turned back around. “Can I ask one last question?”

“Yes,” the flower smiled.

“What’s my… scent?” you asked curiously.

The red flower thought for a moment. “The best answer I can give you is light, like sunlight.”

“Oh,” you nodded appreciatively. “Thanks!” You turned and walked away this time, wondering what light really smelled like.

“Hey!” you called out to your group that had spread throughout the forest. “I talked to the flowers and they said they know what way Alice went, but she was with Heartless.” By the end of your announcement your group had gathered closer.

“You talked to the flowers?” Sora asked you, giving you a strange look with his head cocked sideways slightly.

Your eyebrows rose, “You talked to a doorknob.”

Sora shrugged.

“Where did they take her?” Tifa asked.

You turned and pointed to the dark passage above the pond.

One of Leon’s eyebrows had risen by the time you turned back around. “More climbing trees?” he asked.

You sighed. “That’s what it looks like.”

“Alright,” Yuffie said. “Let’s get to it!”

It took a while for everyone to get up and over to the dark opening and you were in the middle of the group. You pulled yourself up into it and walked through. Your stomach turned somewhat when you walked out the other side and realized you were standing on the ceiling of that strange room you kept finding yourself in.

You walked forward somewhat, taking cautious steps. You were nervous that gravity would randomly go back to normal and you would fall to the floor. Everyone stopped when the Cheshire Cat appeared in front of the group again.

“They’re hiding somewhere,” he told everyone. “And the momeraths outgrabe.”

“What?” Sora’s hand flew to the back of his head as he tried to figure out what the cat was saying.

You ignored the two words you figured the pink creature had made up and waited for him to say whatever he was meaning to tell you. You could tell there was more by the way his eyes raked over your group to make sure everyone was listening.

“Want to find the shadows? Try turning on the light,” he said before disappearing.

_Try turning on the light?_ Immediately you looked for a light switch, but there weren’t any. Maybe the lights were candles?

“Hmm,” Tifa hummed in thought and led the group over to the lights ‘hanging’ from the ceiling. Before anything could be done, however, heartless sprang up from the floor and surrounded your group.

You immediately summoned your keyblade and fought off the monsters near you. You watched Cloud fight his way to the first lamp and light it with a bolt of lightning. He continued to the second while you swung your sword at a larger heartless that was charging at you. It met your attack with a swing of its arm and knocked you back a step. You made to swing at it again, but gravity shifted and right-side-up and it disappeared into smoke. Your group was falling and you saw the table below coming to meet you quickly.

You put your hands below you and shut your eyes tight. _Snow! If we can land on snow- If I could create enough-_

You felt energy surge through your arms and you landed with a thud into a mass of cold powder. When you sat up you felt a little lightheaded and stars were dancing at the corner of your vision, but it looked like everyone was alright. The snow was quickly melting and running off the table and getting your clothes and hair wet, but you were just glad that it had worked.

It took you a moment to realize that everyone was looking at you.

“Quick thinking, [Name],” Yuffie said with a bright smile. “Way to go!”

You sent her a small smile and a little shrug before standing up.

“The shadows should be here soon,” a certain striped cat’s voice came from behind you and you turned around to see him standing a few feet away. “Are you prepared for the worst? If not, too bad!”

_What does that mean?_ Your eyes grew wide as you heard a crash and turned to see a giant, springy heartless had fallen from the ceiling. It stood taller than the table. The drinks to make you shorter or smaller had disappeared. It looked like you would all have to fight it small.

It held two baton-like things in its hands and swung them at you as you would attack. You took some time to learn how often the thing would strike, and how much time you had to attack in between, before you went all out. Sora and Yuffie, however, decided to start attacking with their best right away. They were both quick enough to see the heartless’ attack coming and get out of the way in time, though. It seemed the rest of the group was strategizing the same as you. The heartless’ attacks weren’t sporadic, so at least you could predict when you needed to jump back. You decided you had figured it out enough to start really attacking, so you jumped into the creatures attack radius and began swinging your keyblade at it. You sensed the attack was coming so you rolled back and out of the way. The best spot to attack was its middle, and the best way to reach that was by jumping off of the table and at the creature. So you would roll back from an attack and jump up to reach the top of the table before pulling yourself up again. And the cycle would continue. It felt like this was taking a long time, the heartless seemed to have a lot of endurance and you wondered if they felt pain. You were getting tired now, but the creature suddenly dropped to its knees and everyone rushed to attack from all sides before it regained the strength to get up again. Not long after that it fell to the ground in a heap. You watched as a crystal-looking heart floated up from its body before its body faded into light and disappeared.

You heard a groan from behind you and turned to see the doorknob yawning.

“What a racket,” it said, “How’s a doorknob to get any sleep?”

The keyhole inside of its mouth shone a bright light and you felt the keyblade in your hand tugging in that direction. You let it guide your hand as you heard a “Whoa!” come from Sora. Apparently the same thing was happening to his keyblade. A light shot out of both keyblades and aimed itself at the doorknob’s mouth, the keyhole. There was a clicking sound and then your keyblades fell away and the light faded.

“What was that?” you asked.

“Did you hear that?” Sora said, “It sounded like something closed.” 

A chunk of something bounced out of the keyhole and you watched Leon pick it up.

“That was your keyblades locking this world away from the heartless. And this looks like gummi machinery to me,” the brunette observed. “I’ll give it to Cid to look at.”

“Splendid.”

Everyone turned to see the Cheshire Cat standing on the top of the table. “You’re quite the heroes. If you’re looking for Alice, she’s not here. She’s gone! Off with the shadows, into the darkness.” The Cheshire Cat then disappeared.

You sighed. You had failed to save Alice, and now the heartless had her. Poor girl was probably scared and alone in the darkness somewhere. “Oh no…”

“We’ll find her,” Leon announced, the somber look on his face filled with determination.

“Why did they take her?” you wondered aloud.

“That’s something we have to figure out. I’m guessing it has something to do with Ansem and his plans.”


	7. Let's Split Up

You had all gone back to the ship feeling somewhat defeated after your trip to Wonderland. You met the others in the control room to discuss what happened and your next moves. It was decided that your group could cover more ground more quickly if it was split up. The two keyblade wielders would separate and then could cover all of the worlds in half the time. Sora would travel with Donald and Goofy in their ship and you would travel with the rest of the group on this ship. You had asked curiously why the groups were so lopsided and Leon had explained that King Mickey’s men were capable enough to handle things by themselves as they had been doing before the rest of the group had formed, and they had the most experience. Sora seemed to be getting along the best with them, so you assumed that was why he was chosen over you to go with them. You still found it somewhat strange to talk to animals, and you were generally a quiet person anyway (unless you were really curious about something), so you hadn’t really talked to the duck and dog much yet. 

And then Tifa covered the worlds that each group would visit. Sora would be going to a place called Deep Jungle and you would be going to a world called Olympus Coliseum. Deep Jungle was exactly what it sounded like, she had explained. It was full of green and animals and there were only a few people there to fight off the heartless. Olympus Coliseum was a place full of completely different culture than what you were used to. The people there built grand marble stadiums that housed things like hero tournaments. It sounded much more exciting than Destiny Islands, and you were excited to see it, although you wished you wouldn’t have to fight heartless while you were there and that Sora could be with you. You were sure, though, that if it housed a hero tournament Sora would be there one day. You couldn’t see him missing that.

“And we found this,” Leon said as he held out the gummi equipment to Cid.

The gruff blonde’s eyebrows furrowed as he took it from Leon and inspected it. Suddenly his face lit up and he said, “This is a warp module! The things are darn expensive to buy or we’d already have one. If I hook this into our engine we can use warp drive to get from place to place. Instead of taking a day to travel, it’ll only take an hour.”

“Awesome!” Yuffie pumped a fist into the air. “We’ll be at Olympus Coliseum in no time!”

“But before we take off,” Tifa looked at Yuffie as if she was talking more to her than the rest of the group, “we all need some rest.”

As if on cue you yawned and Sora chuckled at you before he yawned himself. 

“Okay,” Donald turned to Sora, “Go get your stuff and we’ll show you the cabins on our ship.”

“Alright,” Sora nodded and stood to walk up to his room and gather his stuff. 

You were watching him step up the ladder when Cid said to you, “Hey, [Name]. Wanna help me with installing this? I can show ya the engine room.”

“Um,” you turned your head to answer him, “How about in five minutes?”

Cid glanced at the ladder Sora had escaped up as if he knew what you were thinking before nodding with a small smirk on his face.

“Thanks! I’ll be right back!” you called to him as you stood and jogged over to the ladder to catch up to Sora. You knew it wouldn’t take long for him to gather what little he had and take it over to Donald and Goofy’s ship. His door was open when you reached his room at the end of the hall.

You were right, he was practically done shoving everything into the small duffel bag he had.

“Hey,” you greeted him.

He looked up from his bag. “Hey, [Name].”

“Deep Jungle, huh?” you said as you walked over to him with a small smirk on your lips.

“Olympus Coliseum, huh?” he lightly mocked you but sent you another genuine smirk.

You nodded with a sigh. “I guess.”

Suddenly he was hugging you, which is exactly what you were hoping he would get the hint to do. Who knew when we would see each other again?

“I’ll be fine,” he told you. “And you better be, too. Got it?”

You nodded into his shoulder and squeezed him back.

“Okay,” he sighed as you both released each other. “I’ll see you later.”

“If you hear anything about Riku or Kairi, just radio or something, okay?”

He nodded.

“Okay,” you responded with a smile then followed him out the doorway and down the hall.

He left with Donald and Goofy as the others wished him luck and you stared after them. You couldn’t stop yourself from thinking about that dream you had last night.

Is this what he was talking about? We’re separated now. What did he say about our hearts? They won’t separate. I won’t let them. I won’t let Riku’s or Kairi’s, either. We’ll find you.

Your thoughts were broken as Cid walked up next to you. “Ready?” he asked as he held up the piece of gummi machinery.

“Sure,” you nodded affirmatively.

The two of you walked through the doorway that Sora had come out of with his hands covered in grease. You walked down a short hallway that Cid explained held all of the atmosphere controls. From here you could change the temperature, humidity, and even turn the gravity off.

“I don’t suggest that, by the way,” Cid turned back to you with a frown and paused towards the end of the hallway.

You waited for some kind of explanation or funny anecdote about how he had turned the gravity off once but he didn’t say anything.

“Uh, why?” you asked him inquisitively.

“Have you ever tried to make a meal without gravity?” he asked you with his eyebrows raised.

You held in a laugh at the mental image of gravity-less Cid trying to make himself some food. “Oh.”

“I make sure to check the power system for that every day now,” he said and turned back to keep moving forward. You went through another door and found that the floor was now that perforated metal you had always pictured on space ship walkways. Heat suddenly surrounded you and from the doorway you could see a small maze of engines and machinery. Most of the room was plain metal, but the flooring and rails were painted red and some of the cables and hoses were yellow, blue, or green.

“Alright,” Cid said as he started to walk down the stairs, “There are three engine compartments; this one, one in the middle, and one far one. They ain’t closed off from each other but they’re numbered so the people like you that are new to gummi engines can tell where they start and end. I’m gonna connect this module to the center engine, because that’s our main engine.”

You nodded to let him know that you understood and followed him past a large black number one painted onto a sign right before the walkway started into the machinery. The two of you wove your way through the first engine compartment and Cid pointed out important pieces to you like the huge main engine at the far end of the compartment and the cooler nearby that kept the system from overheating.

“All of this machinery can withstand around two thousand degrees of heat,” he explained, “but things run more smoothly when it’s all cooler and the mechanic,” he pointed to himself, “prefers not to work on things that burn through his gloves.”

“That sounds frightening,” you told him with your eyes wide at the idea of work gloves combusting into flames on your hands.

“Mm,” Cid grunted affirmatively and nodded as he kept walking.

“The filters all need to be checked once a week. They don’t usually need to be cleaned for a month, but filters are a good way to start fires,” he told you as he gestured to a part of the machinery that had slots where you could pull out the filters.

You nodded and continued following him.

Soon enough you passed a sign with a big black two on it and found yourself looking at the same pieces of machinery you had seen before.

“Here we go,” Cid said as he approached a plate near the engine. He did something to release it and it swung out towards the two of you to reveal a handful of switches and a mix of yellow, blue, and green wires.

“This part is pretty simple,” Cid told you as he held the warp module out in front of you. “I already had the ship wired for the warp module in hopes that I’d get my hands on one someday.” He grinned a little sheepishly and you giggled a little before he continued. “The three colored cables at the top of that panel get plugged in here.” He pointed to three small holes on the top of the module that were colored blue then yellow then green. “Then the cables at the bottom of the panel get plugged in here.” He pointed to three similar holes on the underside of the module. 

He then proceeded to pull a small loop out of each of the holes. He took the caps off of the wires and wrapped them around their respective loops before pushing the loops and wires into the holes until there wasn’t any metal exposed. The warp module clipped onto something to hold it in place, and then he shut the front plate of the panel.

The two of you started walking back and a question formed in your mind. “Cid?”

The blond in front of you glanced back at you to let you know that he had heard you.

“Could magic fly a gummi ship?”

He seemed to be thinking until you found your way back to the staircase that led up to the door out of the engine room. “Well,” he started, “it would take multiple persons with magical abilities, but I suppose it’s possible.”

You hummed interestedly and thought about what it would take to magically fly a gummi ship. There were two options really; move the entire ship itself or make the engines run. If you kept the engines running you could supply power to the rest of the ship, too, rather than having a dead ship moving through space. That would certainly affect ventilation and gravity.

“Why don’t ya get some sleep?” Cid asked as you found yourselves in the control room again.

You nodded and yawned again, walking over to the stairs that led to the cabins.

Once in bed you found it difficult to fall asleep. You thought about Sora, knowing he would be okay on his own- just as you would be- but you hoped whatever they found on Deep Jungle was something they could handle. You also thought about the rest of your friends, out there somewhere. When you did finally fall asleep, it was a deep slumber.

“Morning, [Name]!”

You blinked at the familiar high school surrounding you. “Morning,” you nodded to the chipper Tidus as he stood next to Wakka. The orange-haired boy was leaning against the lockers, looking frantically through a science book. “I see Wakka forgot to study for…” you looked for the title of the book, “Chemistry. That’s really rough, Wakka. What hour do you have Chem?”

“Uh,” the boy’s eyebrows scrunched together as he tried to remember, “third?”

You laughed, “Okay, well I heard from Riku that the test is seventy-five percent chemical equations you studied last week. Does that help?”

His eyes widened and he grinned, “Thanks, [Name]!”

“No, problem!” you waved as you walked past the two best friends and towards your locker.

“[Name]!” you heard a girl’s voice from behind you call your name and turned to see that Kairi was catching up to you. You both found your lockers at the same time (they were next to each other) and you greeted her with a smile and a, “Hi.”

“Are you excited for the dance on Friday?” the redhead asked you.

You rolled your eyes at her, “Am I ever excited for dances, Kairi?”

She giggled, “No, not really. Except for those couple that you found really cute dresses for at that resale shop.”

You laughed, “Yeah. So has anyone asked you, yet?”

“No,” she smiled and rolled her eyes.

Of course the guys would be too worried about hurting each other’s friendship to ask. You grabbed your books. “We need to get to class, I think the bell’s about to-”

RINGGGG.

Kairi laughed at your timing and the two of you walked down the hallway together. You saw a flash of red hair next to a dirty blonde in the mass of students trying to get to class that seemed to spark your attention. They disappeared into the crowd as quickly as they had appeared.

“[Name?]” Kairi’s hand held your arm lightly. “Are you okay?”

You jumped and turned to look at her. Apparently you had zoned out for a little while. “Yeah, I’m fine. Sorry, let’s get to class.”

You sat down at the desk next to Kairi’s and set your notebook and pencils down. Eventually Riku and Sora walked in and Riku sat in front of Kairi while Sora took the desk in front of yours.

You all greeted each other with some form of good morning and both boys flashed an extra bright grin at Kairi. You held back a giggle at them before the teacher walked in and class started.

The teacher was in the middle of chapter 13 when a voice came over the PA system from the office.

“Please excuse the interruption,” the tinny voice spoke. “Riku and Kairi are needed in the office immediately.”

The teacher looked at the two students pointedly and Riku looked to Kairi who shrugged before the two got up and left, waving a quick goodbye to Sora and you. The teacher began to continue his lesson and you leaned forward to whisper to Sora.

“What do you think that was about?”

His shoulders rose then fell. “I don’t know,” he whispered back, his volume not as discrete as yours.

“Hm,” you grunted curiously before leaning back. The teacher droned on for a little while and then the PA system started talking again.

“Please also excuse this interruption. Sora needs to come to the office as soon as possible.”

“Alright,” the teacher looked at the brunette in front of you. “I should have done this with the other two but I wasn’t expecting to be interrupted. You should hand in your homework before you leave. Do you have it?”

“Uh,” Sora’s hand flew to the back of his neck. “Yeah.” He grabbed a piece of paper from his notebook before standing. “Mostly,” he whispered to you before walking to the front and handing it to the teacher. You smiled and shook your head as the brunette walked out.

“Hopefully we can continue without them needing my entire class,” the teacher joked. A couple students in the front chuckled once before one of them coughed, embarrassed to be one of two people laughing at the dorky teacher. The teacher sighed as if he was used to no one appreciating his humor before he returned to the lesson. 

If anyone was going to get called to the office next, you figured it would be you. They had called your three closest friends; it was only natural that you were next.

“[Name]! It’s time to get up!”

You sat up quickly before taking a moment to take in your surroundings. You remembered that you were on a gummi ship and that you should probably get up so that you were ready for your next mission on Olympus Coliseum. You quickly prepared for the day before going down to the kitchen to see if they had set out breakfast again.

They had, and Yuffie was currently scarfing some pancakes down from her seat at the large table. She greeted you with a nod and a mouth-full-grin and you waved at her with a short giggle. Everyone else was in line in the kitchen grabbing food. You had gotten ready faster today than yesterday. You grabbed a plate and stared down the pancakes, in line behind Cloud with Tifa in front of him. You heard another person come down the ladder and turned to watch Leon walk into the kitchen, still looking a little groggy.

“Good morning,” you greeted the brunette before taking the spatula from Cloud and beginning to fill your plate with food.

“Mornin’,” Leon mumbled before getting in line behind you. You shot him a curious glance with a raised eyebrow but his gaze was focused on the pancakes in front of you. You decided it would be best to just get out of his path to the food so you grabbed a glass of water and walked over to sit down at the table between Yuffie and Cloud. 

Everyone ate quietly for a few minutes. It was strange without Sora at the table. He tended to be the conversation starter. You glanced around the room and found Cid at the front by the windows, looking at one of the screens on the control panel there. You wondered if he had already eaten. You were sure he was probably one of the first to grab food.

“How do we want to approach the Coliseum?” you heard Tifa ask, and looked over to see her plate cleared.

“It should be easier,” Leon said between bites. “We have allies there with Hercules and Meg. Hades has been held off fairly well for a while. But he’s started to use heartless and it’s too much for them to take on. I think we should meet up with them first, see what they have to say, before coming up with a strategy for attack.”

“Cloud?” Tifa turned to the blonde, her voice gentler than before, as if she might be coming to a touchy subject. “You know Hades best. Is there anything we should know?”

You watched Cloud stop eating for a moment, his face blank except for a small serious frown. “He likes to play games. He has a short temper, and won’t be reasoned with. He’s too stubborn for that. It’s been a long time, so I’m not sure what he has up his sleeve.”

“Alright,” Leon nodded. “Cloud, I think it would be best if you took the lead on this one. You know the area and the enemy best.”

The blond nodded, chewing more food.

Your eyebrows knitted together as you thought about what kind of connection Cloud must have to this world. Hades must be the bad guy, and Cloud must’ve fought against him before. It made sense. Cloud had said he had traveled a lot, and you weren’t sure how else someone could have known that kind of guy.

“So this Hades guy,” you spoke up, curiosity getting the better of you again. “What’s he like? How do you think we beat him?”

Tifa and Leon both looked to Cloud when you asked, so you looked to him, too. The blond gave a simple answer.

“He’s the king of the underworld.”

Your eyebrows rose. So you guys were basically dealing with an evil god that had the power of the heartless at his command. Awesome.


End file.
